


Unvoiced

by Xparrot



Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: (for fun and nonprofit), Angst, Cecil Headcanons, Drama, Headcanon, Hospital Vigils, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, POV Carlos, Present Tense, Spoilers for Cassette, The Voice of Night Vale, hurting Cecil to make Carlos angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-14
Updated: 2013-12-30
Packaged: 2018-01-01 14:18:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 35,973
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1044948
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Xparrot/pseuds/Xparrot
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"It doesn't hurt like that." The fear in his eyes, in his too-hard breaths, hardly sounds in his dull baritone. "I'm not the Voice of Night Vale anymore, it seems."</p><p>~</p><p>StrexCorp makes its move against the Voice of Night Vale, and Carlos struggles to handle the aftermath and its impact on Cecil, as the entire town rallies to save their community.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [Без голоса](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2499899) by [bellayanas](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bellayanas/pseuds/bellayanas)



> Great thanks to [Joonscribble](http://archiveofourown.org/users/joonscribble) and [Naye](http://archiveofourown.org/users/naye) for cheering this thing on, and making me consider Steve Carlsberg in more detail.
> 
> I beg the reader's pardon for this self-indulgence. I stretch the canon thin enough that the essential surreality starts to tear, and patch it with angst and sap where there should be quirk. Beware falling plot devices and unfounded headcanon avalanches, most of which will certainly be overturned. Trust no one, deny everything, believe the lie (and for pity's sake don't enter the dog park!)

There are two principles of science, the crucible through which raw data is poured and transmuted to understanding:

Correlation does not imply causation.

Cause precedes effect.

Like so many things, these truths are not always true in Night Vale. Or rather, they're true, but differently. It takes Carlos a year to grasp this, even after he realizes that Night Vale's space is real but its time is not.

But StrexCorp Synernists Incorporated isn't part of Night Vale.

When Carlos hears that StrexCorp has purchased the community radio from Station Management, he knows better than to assume it's a coincidence, that the company made their move scarcely a year after his team arrived in Night Vale. 

Carlos is angry—is furious, as he can't recall ever being before. It takes him most of the night to identify the cause of his anger as fear. At next morning's meeting with the science team, he keeps his voice calm, unaccusing, as he says, "I want to remind you all that research sold to private corporations cannot be published. StrexCorp's nondisclosure agreements are thoroughly binding."

By the furtive exchanged glances, more than one of his associates have already signed such an agreement. More than one are considering it, anyway. The reason is clear enough, but so disappointing.

That evening when he's leaving the lab, Ginevra the physicist meets him by his car. "Hey, boss," she says. "Give us a break, all right?"

Carlos wouldn't have guessed Ginevra to be the one to sell out. No one goes into quantum physics to get rich and famous. But she shakes her head at his betrayed look. "Not me," she denies. "But it's difficult, you know. It's not just the money. You can't publish with no replicable results; we'd be laughing-stocks if we tried. Knowing that someone's interested in your research, that it has purpose, even if it doesn't get your name on a paper..."

"None of my experiments have been publishable, either," Carlos says.

"Yes, but it's easier for you here."

"Easier?" Carlos says blankly. He lived through Valentine's Day and Street-Cleaning Day and agreed to ring the doorbell of a house that wasn't there. He almost died in a hole under a bowling alley. 

Ginevra looks uncomfortable. "Not safer, I don't mean. But it's different for you. If this town loved the rest of us like it loves you..." She shakes her head again. "Forget it. But if you find out who it was, go easy on them? Signing your soul over to StrexCorp should be punishment enough."

It turns Carlos's stomach to hear her say it so plainly. But it doesn't make him less angry, or less afraid.

He cooks dinner for Cecil that night, his mother's _tinga de pollo_. He hasn't made it since he was an undergrad, and he's not positive the chicken is actually chicken—the skin on the breast was scalier than it should be—but Cecil loves it. And over dessert Carlos confesses, "It was one of my science team—or more than one, I don't know—"

"What was?"

Carlos looks at the window, open as per the secret police's mandate for fair weather. He lowers his voice anyway. "The StrexCorp buyout of your station. Strex was informed by a scientist on my team—I don't know how much they know, but...." Enough. They know enough to have started their takeover there. StrexCorp is brutally efficient, obsessively modern. They wouldn't bother with an outdated media outlet like a radio station, unless they knew..."Cecil, I am so sorry—"

Cecil smiles, reaches across the table to take Carlos's hand. "Dear Carlos, are you your scientists' keeper?"

It's very hard to identify rhetorical questions, when it comes to Cecil, so Carlos answers, "No? I'm nominally the director, but they have broad autonomy in their research. Though if I'd known any of them had been contacted—"

"Then it wasn't your fault," Cecil says.

If only it were so simple. Guilt can be ignored, forgotten, absolved. Cause and effect is immutable. "If we hadn't come to Night Vale, StrexCorp wouldn't have known—"

"Or else they would've gotten their information from another source." Cecil grimaces. "Steve Carlsberg, for instance."

"But Steve Carlsberg has been here for years. And StrexCorp has been around for years. That they're interested now—it's because we're here. Because of our research. If we'd never come—"

"If the station's buyout was the inevitable result of you coming," Cecil says, raising Carlos's hand to his lips to brush kisses over the knuckles, "then I'm glad it happened. I would much rather have both you and StrexCorp in my life, than neither."

It's too late, but Carlos does what he can to mitigate further damage. He puts blocks on the email server, though most of the team have the computer savvy to get around firewalls. He removes the radios from the lab, instead records Cecil's show and listens to it in private. It won't stop other scientists from making their own analyses; but at least he can keep his reactions from betraying knowledge that his colleagues might not have yet deduced.

Carlos should've realized sooner that he wasn't the only one piecing together Night Vale's unbelievable truths. He's not the only genius on the team; he's not even the smartest of them. His interest in Cecil's show is well-known, something of a joke around the lab; the other scientists rib him about Cecil's outrageous crush. He should've been more careful, less obvious.

He has nightmares—he's always had nightmares, and since coming to Night Vale they've become a regular event. But they change now, not the usual anxiety dreams of pursuing monsters and surprise quizzes.

Instead Carlos dreams of standing on a mountain, pointing down at Night Vale below. At his command, a giant spotlight illuminates the town. The light is so bright that it erases all shadows, every building on every street standing out in stark relief, from the town hall to the carlot, the bowling alley to the rubble of the waterfront. He can see the clock tower; he can see the bottom of Radon Canyon and inside the dog park.

He takes notes in a notebook, meticulously recording every detail, as the light burns brighter and brighter until everything is whited out, like a nuclear blast, and he's observing an empty desert.

He wakes up with his fingers clenched around a non-existent pen and his face wet, eyes aching from that blinding light.

Carlos stops spending the nights at Cecil's; he goes back to his apartment to sleep. Cecil doesn't ask him why, though he wonders about it on his show. If only obliquely, in accordance with the decency standards; Cecil is as always a professional.

Cecil's show is mostly unchanged; the StrexCorp managers have a light touch. More moderate than the old station management, really. Cecil's editorials aren't censored any more often than before, and his blatant campaigning for Hiram McDaniels goes unchecked. Maybe StrexCorp favors McDaniels' pro-business candidacy. Either way, Cecil doesn't seem too concerned. But then, very few of the things that should concern people ever concern Cecil.

Then Cecil finds some old cassette tapes in his closet, one night when Carlos should've been there, but wasn't. If he had, if he'd been around to suggest they listen to them in private first—

But maybe Carlos wouldn't have. Or not listened far enough. The tape seems harmless at first, and there is something so charming about hearing that much-younger Cecil. Carlos smiles as he listens to the recorded show, recalling himself at the same age, just as obsessed, though in his case with deep-space telemetry and particle colliders.

He doesn't realize at first what he's actually hearing—doesn't realize it until too late. It's already too late. If he were listening to the show live he could have called Cecil, stopped him from playing the end of the tape—but he isn't, and the broadcast has already been heard, the damage is already done.

Carlos can only hope that the scientists at StrexCorp don't know enough to understand. That they won't realize how big a piece of Night Vale's puzzle they've gotten, or won't understand where it fits.

It's a slim hope. He knows the caliber of researchers at StrexCorp.

Cecil sounds the same as usual on the radio the next day, but he doesn't call Carlos that evening, or the next. Carlos isn't surprised. He is, a bit, when Cecil turns up at his apartment door on the third night, slightly unsteady on his feet and with his breath smelling more like actual rocket fuel than alcohol. Cecil doesn't say anything, just takes Carlos's face in his hands. He doesn't say anything but his eyes are pleading, and Carlos leans in and kisses Cecil thoroughly enough to lick the foul bitter flavor of whatever he was drinking off his tongue.

Carlos doesn't have the nightmare of the spotlight that night because he doesn't sleep. Instead he lies awake in his bed, holding Cecil. Cecil doesn't snore or snuffle; he's utterly quiet when asleep, and Carlos spreads his hands over Cecil's chest to feel the rise and fall of his ribcage, counting every slow silent breath until dawn.

Carlos wishes he could ask Cecil not to do his show. To not go back to the station at all. He knows he can't; he can't bear the look Cecil gets, when he has to refuse Carlos anything. So all Carlos can do is listen—in real-time now, wearing headphones in the lab and trying not to react to anything Cecil says.

A week goes by and nothing happens—or rather plenty does, but all within the abnormal norm of Night Vale. There are yellow StrexCorp helicopters in the skies with the black and blue and birds-of-prey; but the sun does not shine any longer or any brighter than it should, and Cecil's show continues as usual.

Two weeks go by, and still nothing happens. Cecil doesn't mention StrexCorp on his show, outside of the sponsor spots—not directly, anyway. He does talk about community service and public works perhaps a little more often, his praise of the Sheriff's secret police and the city council more zealous. And he keeps reminding his listeners that no angels have been seen in Night Vale of late—"which is only to be expected, since angels aren't real."

It makes Carlos uneasy and proud at the same time. They don't talk about it, but Carlos knows it's intentional. Cecil's integrity as a journalist is atypically defined but not inconsistent. His biases are Night Vale's, the point of view unique to those who dwell in the town's unreal reality; they aren't easily swayed. 

Carlos only hopes that StrexCorp doesn't realize that while they might have bought out the radio station, the Voice of Night Vale is not for sale.

Three weeks go by, and Cecil gets a StrexCorp memo politely advising him to make his sponsor spots more upbeat, as marketing research shows that tone in advertising matters more than words. He reads the memo aloud on air, apologizing for failing previous sponsors, and then practices variations of 'upbeat', most falling somewhere between laughably phony and starkly terrifying. It's the kind of thing that would be derisive satire if anyone else were doing it, but Carlos is pretty sure Cecil is genuinely concerned he's let the local businesses down.

StrexCorp apparently agrees; they don't send another memo.

Four weeks go by, and Carlos, working late on semi-illicit wheat-related research, dozes off in the lab and wakes up to the mass spectrometer beeping and the spiral-bound notebook his head was on imprinted on his cheek, and no memory of any nightmares disturbing his sleep.

If StrexCorp theorized the truth, surely they would have tried to test it by now. Their purchased scientists would have devised an experiment to ensure that the company's money wasn't being wasted on a fruitless endeavor.

Maybe, Carlos thinks, maybe StrexCorp has no idea. Maybe they're just buying up local radio stations across the country to expand their national media domination. Or maybe they observed the significance of Night Vale's community radio without comprehending it. Effect follows cause, but time doesn't work in Night Vale, and without linear entropy...it took Carlos a year to realize any of it himself, after all, even with personal involvement. Maybe he's given StrexCorp too much credit.

It's three in the morning—according to a clock that's not real—but Carlos drives over to Cecil's instead of back to his apartment. Cecil answers the door after a single knock. "Carlos?" he says, and Carlos says, "I just wanted to see you," and Cecil beams and pulls him inside.

The next morning Carlos makes pancakes and kisses Cecil awake to give him his plate. He goes to the lab with his lips sticky with maple syrup, and listens to Cecil's show on his headphones as he works, shaking his head at Cecil's industriously cheerful shilling for Sony and smiling in spite of himself at Cecil's scathing criticism of the Night Vale Blood Bank's failure to invest its A-positive in the (apparently lucrative?) plasma market.

Then Cecil says, _"Listeners, I have just received another memo from our new station owners, StrexCorp—Strex: remaking the world to be a better place, as many times as it takes. The memo is printed on thick cardstock designed to be ergonomic and papercut-resistant; it feels very crisp and official in my hands. Its message is in a plain black type-face, and reads, 'To Cecil Ger—"_

Cecil stops abruptly, falling silent. Carlos listens closely, turns up the volume, straining to hear any sound through the hiss of dead air.

He's reaching for his phone when Cecil coughs a single dry cough, and draws a noisy breath, rasping in the microphone.

Then Cecil screams, terrified, agonized, like he's being torn apart.

Carlos rips off the headphones and sprints for the lab door, ignoring the stares and questions of his colleagues. By the time he makes it to his car, the radio is silent again. He's halfway to the station before a voice finally comes on—not Cecil; the station's latest intern, Carlos thinks, though he can't remember their name or face, and the intern's voice is so shrill and quavering that their gender's unclear, " _S-sorry for the interruption; we go now t-to the weather—"_

There's a helicopter on the radio station roof, its rotating blades nearly nicking the steel signal tower. It's blue, so Carlos is not surprised when two of the Sheriff's secret police bar his entry. They have batons and tasers and riot gear. Carlos doesn't hesitate, just charges past them, slamming his shoulder into the door to force it open. 

The secret police don't tase him or hit him; they grab his arms, drag him back from the door. The shorter one pushes up her mirrored visor to shout into his face, "Sir! Carlos! Please calm down, please—Cecil's not inside, we're taking him to the hospital—look—"

She points up at the helicopter on the roof. Its blades are spinning up, their throbbing vibrating the air.

The police officer's grip on his arm is firm and her eyes are wide. She is so pale that the freckles scattered across her snub nose show sharply against her gray face. Carlos has seen her eating at Big Rico's, but only in civilian clothes; he'd assumed she was a yoga instructor or a talon hygienist. Her mouth moves, but he can't hear what she's saying over the thunder of the helicopter taking off.

She shifts her hold on his arm to pull him toward the waiting squad car, its lights flashing. Carlos lets himself be dragged along, be pushed into the cruiser. 

Most people taken away in a Night Vale secret police car are never seen again. If she's arresting him, it's no less than he deserves. Whatever StrexCorp has done to the Voice of Night Vale—she knows. Everyone in Night Vale knows, most probably. Likely more than Carlos, though he can guess the what, if not how. He knows what he would have done, what experiment would be necessary to prove the hypothesis, if he'd cared more about gaining the proof itself than its potential impact. If he didn't mind destroying the subject in order to comprehend it.

This wasn't his experiment, but it might've been. And StrexCorp wouldn't have known to do it, if no one had tried to research this fascinatingly impossible community, if no scientist had ever turned their attention to Night Vale's radio.

Cause is followed by effect.

Carlos leans his head against the cruiser's glass window, tells the sunlit streets of Night Vale speeding past, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry—"


	2. Chapter 2

In his senior year at Columbia, Carlos's adviser had told him, "You are both the most brilliant and the most relentlessly rational student I have ever taught."

"Thank you," Carlos had said, but the professor shook her head, replied, "That was no compliment. You terrify me.

She'd demanded that Carlos take a grad seminar in scientific ethics before graduation. He spent most of the course arguing with the professor about intent versus result, about knowledge versus application. Whether Oppenheimer had a responsibility to feel guilt, or even a right to, when the truth of the atom existed and would exist whether or not the Manhattan Project ever happened.

(Carlos wonders now—as he wonders about so many things these days, it seems—if Cecil had ever been told that he terrified someone. Most likely yes. Such fear seems the kind of thing Night Vale teachers would tell all their students, as a character-building exercise.)

 

* * *

 

The secret police do not take Carlos to Radon Canyon, but to the Night Vale General Hospital.

Yellow StrexCorp helicopters buzz overhead like giant wasps, but none can land; the hospital's rooftop helipad is occupied by the blue secret police chopper, and the parking lot is completely full. More vehicles pull up as the police car turns into the front drive, clearing its way with a wailing siren. People park along the curb, doubled rows of cars lining the streets around the hospital.

There must have been an announcement on the radio, Carlos thinks. The intern, whoever they were, telling everyone where Cecil had been taken.

His secret police escort abandons him to control the crowd. The lobby and waiting room are already packed, but a path is cleared for Carlos to stumble through, people shoving in to let him pass, though he doesn't have a siren of his own. Almost everyone is standing, crowded so close that their elbows are knocking; but somehow there's a plastic chair free, between Old Woman Josie and John Peters ( _you know, the farmer_ , Cecil's voice adds in Carlos's head.)

Carlos sinks into the seat. John passes him a styrofoam cup of awful coffee. Josie places a ball of the silvery spider-silk yarn she's knitting on Carlos's lap, saying, "Here, make yourself useful," in a comforting way.

Mayor Pamela Winchell is having an energetic debate with a potted plant that she seems to be losing. Leann Hart is scribbling rapidly in a dog-eared notebook, lips stretched into joyless rictus grin. The staff of Dark Owl Records have formed an impromptu drum circle, beating out rhythms on overturned wastebaskets and cafeteria trays and a couple probably-human skulls that Carlos hopes they got from the morgue and not somewhere less...sanitary.

Outside the window, the sun is blotted out by the glow cloud, humming and sparking. A bloodstone circle has been set up on the paved ambulance bay, the largest circle Carlos can recall seeing, even on the worst holidays. The city council stands in it, chanting in unison. More people are pressed together at the circle's edge, Jeremy Godfrey looking morosely like he wants a beer, Madeline LaFleur gulping coffee. The Rico family are still in their striped pizzeria uniforms, passing out iced tea and octagon-flavored water to stave off heatstroke. The elementary school teachers herd clusters of children, dispersing them to the appropriate parents.

There are hundreds of people gathering, maybe thousands. Carlos has never managed to get any official census or demographics data on Night Vale, but most of the town's population must be here now. Carlos has not met many of them; but he's listened to Cecil's show for over a year now. He knows them all.

And they all know him. Everywhere Carlos looks, the townspeople meet his eyes. Some give him damp-eyed, wobbly smiles; some shake their heads in sad sympathy. 

None of the other scientists have arrived. They're all working as usual back at their lab, in an abandoned town center. If Carlos called them, they would come, to investigate and examine and record. This vigil is as unusual a phenomenon as any in Night Vale; it should be objectively observed. But Carlos cannot bring himself to get out his phone. Cannot seem to make his fingers move from where they're locked around the empty coffee cup.

Not one person here, not a single citizen of Night Vale, is looking at Carlos with anything like accusation or anger. He's a newcomer, here less than a year and a half; he's a stranger to Night Vale and by all rights they should be suspicious, by all rights they should see the obvious correlation between his arrival and this calamity.

But this is Night Vale, where none of the clocks are real; and all he sees in the eyes of those around him is compassion and commiseration and a shared, unspoken hope.

Carlos does not know how long he sits in the hard plastic chair, crushing his coffee cup to styrofoam shreds as murmurs ebb and flow through the crowd. Whenever a silence falls, the ringing in his ears sounds like a scream. Carlos can't bring himself to speak. His throat is parched, tongue thick in his mouth; and his mind is frozen, as if the flow of his thoughts are trapped under ice. He cannot think; he can only remember Cecil's cough and Cecil's scream.

He doesn't want to talk over that memory, does not want to lose it. Not if it's the last of Cecil that he may ever hear.

At last there is a change in the tenor of the murmuring around him, a new air of anticipation. Carlos's shoulders ache, stiff from being too tense for too long, as he lifts his head, turning with everyone else to the waiting room door. Teddy Williams and two other doctors enter, and everyone quiets, canting forward to listen.

"Cecil is...is sleeping peacefully. Now," Teddy Williams reports, after a brief hesitation. "He's—physically, he's fine," and the crowd sighs as one, Carlos with them, breathing in and out with everyone around him.

It's as if the oxygen in that breath finally reaches Carlos's brain, his frozen thoughts sparking and flaring. He hands the yarn back to Josie, stands up—no need to shove, everyone moves out of his way, and he receives a few pats on the back as he walks to the doctors, encouraging him. "The memo," he asks, "the memo Cecil was reading, do we have it? It has to be studied—carefully; it shouldn't be touched, if it were laced with a topical poison, or—"

"The secret police have already brought it," Teddy Williams says, "and we've got experts examining it now. But if the big-shot scientist thinks he can help us undereducated hicks..." Then the man's mouth twists and he passes a hand over his face, shakes his head. "Sorry, Carlos," he says. "It's been a hell of a day, and this...science won't help with this. We all know what's happened, but putting it right...been a long, long time since we dealt with anything like this. But of course you want to help—"

"He has to help." Old Woman Josie totters through the crowd over to them, reaches up to rest her gnarled hand on Carlos's shoulder. "He's got as much as right as any of us—and we'll need him, most like, especially with every Erika out of town..."

So Carlos, along with Josie, accompanies the doctors to the hospital's diagnostic room. It's not exactly the norm: there are lit panels on the walls, but they have obscene stained-glass icons over them instead of x-ray film; and a smoke-filled pentagram is painted on the tile floor, with a circle of fine black ash carefully laid over it.

The assembled experts are also somewhat unexpected. In addition to Teddy Williams and the other doctors, and Josie, there's also Simone Rigadeau from the earth sciences building, a pair of the obligatory lurking hooded figures, and Nazr al-Mujaheed. But the question of how a high school coach can help with this flies out of Carlos's head when he sees through the smoke to what's inside the pentagram, crouched and twitching on the floor as if held down by an invisible force—"Is that a _librarian_?"

It is, in fact. They need information, historical precedent. It seems that Teddy Williams wasn't exaggerating, to say it's been a long time. Night Vale has had a Voice for years—decades, possibly centuries, insofar as time can be accounted for in Night Vale at all. After so many generations, the transition from one Voice to the next is an established custom. Not an easy one, Carlos thinks, remembering the cassette recording. But a matter of course.

StrexCorp has disrupted that course, broken the chain and left Night Vale Voiceless.

Josie and Simone talk with the librarian, Nazr helping Josie bend her arthritic knees so she can sit on the floor and meet the horrible, spectacled eyes. Carlos can't understand what they say, but the librarian's yowls and snarls seem subdued, more than the pressure of the bloodstones' ritual binding.

The librarian is yet a citizen of Night Vale; a citizen with a voice but no Voice, wounded and enraged by this mutilation.

Carlos should not be here. Whatever Josie said, he has no real right, when his own hurt is so personal, so negligible compared to the greater loss. If there were anything he could actually do to help—but he knows nothing. 

He reads the memo, turning the glass wine bottle it's been protectively sealed within, and he understands the awful, simple mechanics of what StrexCorp did—but he can't imagine how to undo it. He can't even guess if StrexCorp knew what they were doing, and can't decide what would be worse, if this were a calculated, sadistic experiment to test a hypothesis; or unintended brutality, all of Night Vale's suffering just collateral damage of StrexCorp's clumsy greed. That at least he should be able to tell, better than anyone here. If this were an experiment, he should be able to recognize the work of a fellow scientist. But he has no idea.

Carlos is useless here, nothing to offer but ignorant questions with answers he doesn't have the context to comprehend. Once Josie and Simone finish the interrogation and the librarian is banished back to the public library, Carlos stops asking anything. He listens from the corner, letting the others confer without interruption, discussing the possibilities, the various options. They're optimistic, the stubbornly certain way that only people of Night Vale can be optimistic, in the face of impossible and ludicrous reality.

Carlos is not a Night Vale citizen; he cannot bear the weight of so much hope. He leaves the diagnostic room, but stays in the corridor, rather than return to the crowded waiting area, all those people who don't blame him, who are hurting in a way he can't even comprehend and yet look at him so sympathetically.

Standing alone in silence, Cecil's scream still echoes in his ears. Carlos wonders if he's even remembering it correctly, that second he heard before he was running out of the lab. He might be imagining the agony, the despair. The computer will have recorded all of it; but he's not sure he'll ever be able to listen to that show again. He's not sure he'll be able to listen to any of his carefully labeled recordings again, and he hates himself for that selfishness, that he's thinking of such trivial losses, when Cecil—when all of Night Vale—

"Carlos, there you are!" The voice is soprano and shockingly vivacious, as startling as the hug, warm soft arms wrapping around his waist, squeezing tight.

Carlos stares down at the young woman in his arms. "Dana?" he asks uncertainly. The last time he saw Cecil's former intern, she was much less substantial. "How'd you escape the..." She'd not been in the dog park anymore, according to her and Cecil's confused conversations; but not quite in this plane of reality, either...?

Dana shrugs. "I didn't escape, so much as...Night Vale might need me now, so here I am. And here you are—oh, Carlos, I am so sorry. For all of us, of course; but for you especially..."

Her compassion burns like salt on an open wound. Carlos pushes her back, separates himself from her too-comforting embrace. "Not me—why especially me? Why would I be special? I'm not even—this isn't _my—_ " He's stammering, stuttering, searching for words that aren't there and his voice rises in his frustration until he's yelling into Dana's face, "You shouldn't—no one should care, not now, not when—he screamed, Cecil _screamed!_ And I—there's nothing—I can't do anything for him—!"

"Carlos," Dana says, quietly, but distinct enough that Carlos hears it over his hysteria.

He snaps his mouth shut so hard that his teeth click together, ducks his head and breathes in and out before he dares to unseal his lips to mumble, "I'm sorry, I didn't mean—I don't know why—I'm sorry—"

"It's all right," Dana says, gently, and gently she puts a surprisingly existent hand on his arm, gives it a reassuring squeeze. "It's okay, this is hard for all of us. A little easier for me, because I'm an intern; I've practiced this, choosing my own words even in crisis. For you—it must be harder for you, being from outside Night Vale; you'd have had to get used to it in the first place, and then to have it gone...and that on top of what Cecil means to you..."

"I don't..." Carlos shakes his head, defeated even trying to articulate a question. "I can't—science can't help here. There's nothing I can do for him—for anyone now—"

"That's not true," Josie interrupts, as she hobbles out of the diagnostic room. She nods at Dana, a brief but assured gesture of acknowledgment, which Dana returns as graciously. Josie seizes Carlos's arm, leaning on him as a makeshift cane. "Give an old woman some support, boy," she scolds, as if he'd tried to escape her. "You can walk me back to the waiting room, and then you can get yourself to the ICU—Teddy says that Cecil is waking up."

"He is?" Carlos's pulse skips a beat and then starts pounding in his ears, like his heart had forgotten its duty and is now trying to make up for lost time.

"He is," Josie says, "and you should be the one to speak with him."

"Why?" Carlos demands, as they start down the hall, slowly in deference to Josie's knees. "Why me—it could be anyone, the whole town is here—"

"The whole town isn't Cecil's boyfriend," Josie says tartly. "This will be hard on him, too—harder, maybe; I can't rightly say. But I know he'll need..." She trails off in an unsure moment, and Carlos realizes that she is struggling, too, for all she's old and wise and cantankerous enough to have confidence in her own voice. They've made it halfway to the ICU before Josie says, finally, "He'll want you there."

"Are you sure?" Carlos asks.

Josie looks at him sharply. "When has Cecil ever _not_ wanted you there?"

"But this...it isn't the same," Carlos says. "Cecil isn't the same. Not now." He doesn't understand, not enough, not so he can help solve anything. But he understands this much. He thinks of Cecil listening to the cassette tape, " _I don't remember having a brother. These tapes don't make sense to me. When did I intern here—?"_

Josie reaches up to pat Carlos's cheek. Her palm is cool and dry, soft like suede leather for all the wrinkles and gnarled joints. "You are such a smart boy, aren't you," she says. "A sharp mind and a soft heart—it's a rare thing. Beautiful to behold; but hard to be, isn't it."

Carlos knows she means it as a comfort, but it isn't. Not now, no matter how much it should be, if he were better, if he were less selfish.

He knows that Night Vale loves him; the town's own Voice told him so often enough.

But he doesn't know if Cecil himself does, and it's hard to think or move or breathe, beyond the dread of that.

They reach the ICU. Josie lets go of him to lean on Dana's offered arm. Down the hall, Carlos can hear muffled voices from the waiting room—too many to distinguish conversations, but the tones are a little less hushed, a little less tense. 

One voice rises above the buzzing chatter, strident and desperate. "Please, you have to—let me by!"

It takes Carlos a second to place it; though he's met the man on a few occasions, he's never heard Steve Carlsberg speak in much above a mistrustful mutter. Now Steve is shouting, "If Cecil's waking up—if he's Cecil, if he's really Cecil—please, just let me talk with him for a minute—just a minute! Just thirty seconds—just let me see him— _please!_ "

Josie shakes her head regretfully. "Can't help but feel for him."

"Then let him in," Carlos says. His hands are cold and sweating at the same time. "Let _him_ talk to Cecil, I can't—this shouldn't, this doesn't have anything to do with me, I'm not even from Night Vale—"

Josie tuts. "Too late for that now, boy. Far too late, and you're well smart enough to know it."

"But—what if—I've only been here a year and a half. Can you even be sure that Cecil remembers me?"

Josie's eyes soften, and for a moment Carlos can see the kindness that allowed her home to be a refuge for angels. "I knew Cecil Palmer when he was a boy," she says. "He was naive and reckless, cocky and way too eager to please. He was a good kid. I liked him. I miss him sometimes." She pats Carlos's cheek again. "Whatever happens, Carlos, whatever you decide, most of us will understand."

Dana nods at him, her eyes bright. "I'm ready," she says. "If it comes to that—it will be nice to be home. So tell Cecil not to worry. I want him to be happy—I want you to be happy. We all do," and she smiles, the first real smile Carlos can remember seeing since he heard Cecil scream.

He can't make himself return it. But he can't let her down—can't let Night Vale down, any more than he already has. 

Carlos pushes open the door and enters Cecil's room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *clears throat* So is this thing on? Hope so, as there's quite a bit more to come...


	3. Chapter 3

Cecil has been put in a private room. It's not a standard hospital room, at least not for hospitals outside Night Vale. It holds no equipment, no monitors or life-support machines or IV racks. Instead there is a bloodstone circle set in the tile floor, with a single bed in its center. Sigils are painted on the walls, matching sets of complex symbols with the bed at the intersection of their points. By their slow oozing and metallic reek, they were drawn in blood, recently. Most of it is human-red, though some is darker, almost purple; and one set is in green—who on the hospital staff has copper-based erythrocytes? Carlos wonders in passing.

The bed itself looks like a regular hospital bed, with white sheets, even, though they have the sheen of satin rather than crisp cotton linens. Cecil is lying under those sheets, in a lavender hospital gown, seemingly asleep; but when Carlos enters, his eyes open. He sits up, propped against the pillows, to look at Carlos, frowning in a puzzled way.

"Um—hi. Hello, Cecil," Carlos says. "Are you—how do you—ah, do you know who I am?"

Cecil's frown deepens, but before Carlos's panic spikes too high he replies, "Of course. You're Carlos, the scientist."

Carlos waits a beat, but Cecil doesn't add, _beautiful Carlos_ , or, _my boyfriend_.

And Cecil's voice—somehow Carlos was expecting the timorous, cracking teenager's voice on that old cassette tape. But Cecil's baritone is unchanged.

Unchanged, and yet almost unrecognizably different. Carlos cannot define how—timbre, or decibel, or intonation? It's still deep and resonant and solid; but it is less, so much less.

Or maybe it's just the emotions that he's missing, that he's so used to hearing whenever Cecil talks to or of him. The blatant adoration which confused Carlos the first time he heard it, made him assume he was being mocked, and then fear worse than that, before he at last came to understand. Without that feeling, Cecil's voice sounds stifled—not the measured calm of his broadcast reports, but flat, sapped of shape and color.

Carlos wills his expression not to change, his own voice to stay steady as he replies, "Good—that's good, that you know me. Do you know where you are—no, you probably wouldn't. You're in the hospital."

Cecil looks down at the white bed, over at the bloody sigils on the walls. "Night Vale General?" he asks.

Carlos nods. "Yes, exactly."

For a moment Cecil looks baffled. Then he blinks and there's stark horror in his eyes. "No—but if this is Night Vale—" His breath catches, and he brings his hand up to his throat, fingers digging into his own trachea. "I—I can't—"

"Are you all right? Does it hurt?" Carlos asks anxiously. "I don't believe there should be any pain; I can get Teddy Williams—"

"No." Cecil shakes his head. His fingers loosen their grip, though he's still breathing too loudly. "No, it doesn't—it doesn't hurt like that." The fear in his eyes, in his too-hard breaths, hardly sounds in his dull baritone. "I'm not the Voice of Night Vale anymore, it seems."

"No," Carlos says, flat himself to try to keep the guilt and grief in his throat from choking him. "Do you remember what happened today? After we woke up this morning..."

It feels like a lifetime ago; Carlos can barely recall it himself. But Cecil says, flatly factual, "You made pancakes." He exhales. "I was at the station. I was doing the show. The story on the blood bank, and then..." He frowns, tilts his head as if trying to make a loose memory slide into place.

"You received a memo," Carlos says. "A memo from StrexCorp. It was a..." There is no abstract scientific vocabulary for this. 'Exorcism' is hardly an accepted term in legitimate disciplines. "They fired you."

"... _Fired_ me? But my contract—"

"When StrexCorp bought the station, they apparently revised the employee contract," Carlos explains. "It allowed for termination—though not for them to select a replacement, not without the City Council's approval. Which the Council hasn't given."

"So..." Cecil's brow furrows. "I'm no longer the Voice of Night Vale, but no one else is, either? But how—"

"That's what everyone is here to find out. They're all waiting outside now." Cecil should know this; it's important for him to know this.

It's something he should know already, but he doesn't. He looks astonished. "Everyone? Are they—is it..."

"All of Night Vale, pretty much," Carlos says. "They're doing all right—they're here for you. They're worried for you."

Cecil considers this a moment, staring past Carlos, as if trying to see through the walls to the gathered crowd. Then his gaze returns to Carlos, curious. "Everyone is here, but you're the one who came to talk to me?"

"They asked me to," Carlos says. "Josie—she told me be the one to talk to you first. And Dana—Dana's here at the hospital, Cecil, she's back. At least for the moment."

"She is? That's good to hear," Cecil says, but if he's actually happy it can't be heard in his voice, and his smile is reflexive, meaningless.

Carlos is used to Cecil being occasionally tongue-tied around him, even if he's mostly gotten over it since they started going out in earnest. But it's not the same now. The apprehension with which he's looking at Carlos isn't ecstatic nervousness about saying the right thing, but worry about what Carlos might say to him. And all the things Carlos is used to hearing in Cecil's voice—affection, admiration, the deeper feelings Carlos is uncomfortable naming, even if Cecil is not—Carlos cannot find them now.

Cecil remembers him, at least. It's more than Carlos could have asked for; more than he deserves. He keeps his voice even with effort. "If you want to talk with Dana, or anybody in town, just let me know, I can go get them. Or if there's anything else I can do—"

"Carlos," and it barely sounds like his name when Cecil says it like that, like it's only a word and nothing more.

"It's good you're feeling better," Carlos says desperately. "I know this isn't easy for you, Cecil; I don't want to make it any harder. I can go, but I want you to know that if there's anything I can do, any way I can help you—scientifically, that is—"

"Carlos, I'm sorry."

 _No_ —no, please, no, he doesn't want this—"It's all right," Carlos tells him. "You shouldn't worry about that. I realize that it's different now. That you're different." _You don't have to tell me_ , Carlos wants to say; but it would be wrong, wouldn't it, to try to censor Cecil's feelings now—not an echo of the town's unlikely hero-worship, but Cecil's own heart, expressed in Cecil's own voice. He should listen. He owes Cecil that much—and so much more, but if this is all he can do... "It's all right," Carlos says again, supportively. "I'm all right with it."

Cecil's eyes drop from Carlos's to study his own hands, picking at the white satin sheets. He takes a moment to speak, the words which usually come so easily to him scattered and hidden. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you," Cecil says finally. "If I'd explained it to you—you're a scientist, of course, I should've have realized that you'd want to know. If I'd told you before, it might be easier now, for you to understand—"

"I do understand," Carlos says. "I know what happened—I've known for a while what it meant, that you were the Voice of Night Vale."

Cecil looks up from his hands to blink at him owlishly. "...You know?"

"I formed a hypothesis months ago," Carlos says, "but I wasn't sure if it was something I should talk about openly, so I couldn't confirm it. Then you played that cassette. And now, what happened today...I won't swear to getting all of it, or most; but I understand enough to know that it wasn't really you speaking to me any time before now. Not the you who you are now. I don't expect....the relationship I had before was with the Voice of Night Vale. That's not who you are anymore; I understand that."

"Oh." Cecil smiles that reflexive, empty smile. "I'm glad you understand. I am sorry—I truly never meant to hurt you, Carlos, or mislead you—"

"I know," Carlos says. "I never thought you did." Cecil can be vindictive but he isn't cruel. That is Cecil himself, not the Voice; Carlos can see that much now. Carlos can see so much now, so many answered questions—at another time it might have excited him; but it's too close now, too raw. It hurts all the more to look at Cecil now and realize how much of the man he has come to know this past year and a half was _Cecil_ , not Night Vale—or perhaps how much of Night Vale that Carlos knows was Cecil all along. 

If Night Vale gets a new Voice, the distinctions should be more apparent. Carlos might appreciate that in the future, the chance to have his hypotheses confirmed or denied. Now it's only another weight crushing his chest, to think of getting to know another Voice, of hearing another Voice speak Night Vale's love to him.

Part of him wants to ask if Cecil remembers that—remembers any of the feelings he doesn't share now. Wants to ask how real those feelings were—though even if Cecil can remember, would it hurt any less, to hear that they were?

Carlos turns to leave, to go to get Dana, or Josie—someone who is friends with Cecil, a less complicated, less painful connection that can be more easily re-forged. Who can better support him through this.

He stops when Cecil says his name, "Carlos," in his flat, muted voice. Carlos turns back. Cecil's eyes have dropped and he's plucking at the sheets again, as he says, "I know I'm not what I was, not who you were together with. I know I'm not the Voice of Night Vale, that I'm no one and nothing interesting now. But do you think there's any chance," Cecil swallows, "any possibility, that, over time, you might come to—to like me?"

Carlos stares at him. "...What?"

"If not as you did," Cecil adds quickly. "I understand that you couldn't possibly—that you don't—but if we could at least be friends? I would like us to still be friends..."

"I'd like us to be friends, too," Carlos says. His own voice sounds as hollow in his ears. "Very much, Cecil. And it won't take any time for me to like you; I do already, of course."

"You do?" Cecil looks up, and his smile isn't perfunctory now—it's different, more subdued, less definitively sincere; but it's bright and genuine and so hopeful. It makes Cecil look much younger, a strange effect when Carlos is used to Cecil's indeterminate agelessness.

Cecil Gershwin Palmer was fifteen years old, on that cassette tape. If that was actually when he became the Voice of Night Vale...he's many years older now, has many memories since; but if his heart is still young...?

There is a rushing roar in Carlos's ears. It might be his own heart, pounding at rabbit-speed. Didn't he originally think that Cecil's much-mentioned crush was so immature? Correlation does not imply causation; he's yet to confirm which way the influence flows—from Night Vale to Night Vale's Voice, or the other way around. Does the Voice speak for the community, or tell the community how to speak?

Or is there a difference, in a town where time doesn't work, where cause can sometimes follow effect, if it bores of always being followed?

Carlos is a scientist, always. If he were not, he couldn't do this now; but as an experiment, when there is a hypothesis to prove... "Cecil," Carlos says carefully, cautiously; raw truth is a hazardous compound, as unstable as nitroglycerin and even more destructive; and words are dangerously unsteady on his tongue now. "I love you—I fell in love with you when you were the Voice of Night Vale, and I do love Night Vale; but it isn't only this community that I love, or its Voice—I couldn't love something so big as that, not the way I can love a single person. Not the way I love you. Just you.

"But these are _my_ feelings—you have no obligation to return them; you shouldn't be beholden to anything the Voice of Night Vale ever said to me. As painful as it is for me to know that you don't return my feelings anymore, it would be far worse if you pretended to return them, just to spare me a broken heart..."

He doesn't know what he wants Cecil to say—to be honest, or not be honest; to listen to him, or deny him and spare his heartbreak anyway—

Cecil doesn't say anything, though. Instead he gets up from his hospital bed—fairly leaps from it, and before Carlos can react Cecil is in his arms, pressing his lips to Carlos's. The kiss is tentative at first, unsure; but when Carlos doesn't retreat it deepens. There is a hunger to it that is...not unfamiliar, but usually more controlled. But the attentiveness—the way he responds to Carlos's every tiny reaction, before Carlos himself even realizes what he wants—and the odd kind tenderness of it—not innocence, not like this is a first kiss; but like he wants it to be as perfect as the first—that is Cecil, all Cecil.

Carlos is so startled—so astonished, so overjoyed—that when Cecil suddenly wanes, slumping in his arms, Carlos nearly doesn't catch him in time. He drags Cecil back to the bed in the bloodstone circle. Cecil looks alarmingly exhausted, but he's grinning, wide and half-delirious. He grabs onto Carlos's wrist, says, "Oh, sweet, helpful Carlos—"

"Stay there," Carlos instructs, "don't get up again; you're still recovering." He retrieves the pillow from the floor, eyeballs the blood-sigils on the wall, trying to figure out the exact placement, that Cecil's head will be at the intersection of their invisible axes.

"My beautiful, thoughtful Carlos," Cecil babbles, and his voice still sounds strange, too light and clear and un-portending; but it's recognizable now as it wasn't before. "I'm not pretending, I never was, to say that I love you—all of me, before and now. Night Vale loves you, of course we do—after all you've devoted to us, your brilliant science and your peculiar rationality and your perfect hair, how could we not love you? And I'm a citizen of Night Vale, I love you like we all do—but _I_ saw you first, I saw first how beautiful you were—and are, and will be—"

If Carlos's truth was dynamite, then Cecil's is an atomic bomb. Carlos feels blasted, shell-shocked. Distractedly he thinks there is irony, that in a town with as many secrets as Night Vale, its Voice could be someone so shamelessly, agonizingly honest. "Yes, all right, Cecil," he says, for lack of a better answer, pushing Cecil's shoulders to lie him down on the bed. 

"And I love how you say my name," Cecil says. "I wish...could you say my full name, now?"

Carlos hesitates a moment, remembering the address on the memo that had done this. But Cecil looks so expectant, Carlos can't deny him. "Cecil Gershwin Palmer," he says, wishing he could do more with it, make it resound with all the meaning it holds, as Cecil once could.

Cecil sighs to hear it anyway, though as much wistful as delighted. "Ah," he says, tipping his head back on the pillow, closing his eyes. "It's strange, how familiar it sounds in your mouth. Or maybe the strangeness is what's familiar..."

"I could have called you it before?" Carlos says. "If you'd asked."

Cecil opens his eyes, sits up to frown at Carlos. "You couldn't have," he denies. "It wasn't mine before—you heard the cassette, didn't you? I gave my name, and it was taken...a lot was taken. I didn't realize...I had a brother. A brother, can you imagine it?"

Carlos has tried, and not quite succeeded. Somehow it's easier now, to picture this Cecil with a sibling, boys bickering at the breakfast table. "Do you remember his name, now?" he asks, out of curiosity.

"I remember it," Cecil says, nodding. He's staring past Carlos's head, searching empty air for newly refunded memories. "I remember what he sounded like, teasing me. And what he looked like—oh! I can remember my mother's face! I thought she didn't have one; but if I saw her now, I could pick her out of any crowd..."

This should be joyful, regaining such precious memories; but Cecil sounds strained, his voice stretched thin and brittle, and his staring eyes are opened too wide, unblinking, liquid shimmers welling at their corners. "Cecil," Carlos says, grasping his shoulders, leaning into his unseeing line of sight, "you don't have to think about this now, not if you don't want to—"

Cecil shudders, blinks. His eyes refocus on Carlos's face in degrees. He opens his mouth without speaking, but his fingers wind around Carlos's wrist, give a little imploring tug. Carlos willingly sits on the bed beside him and folds his arms around Cecil. Cecil is trembling, and Carlos hesitantly strokes his back, combs his fingers through Cecil's hair, until Cecil's own arms wrap around Carlos in return and hold on.

"I think," Cecil says after a moment, shaky and so soft that Carlos can only hear because Cecil's lips are brushing his ear, "I think I might be able to do this, if I have you, my Carlos. If I still have your voice, even if no one else's, it might be enough for me..."

"Enough?" Carlos repeats, still holding Cecil. "Enough for what, Cecil?"

Cecil sighs, a breath that pulls so much from him that he sags against Carlos, deflated. "I can remember this now, too—how being the Voice of Night Vale was all I ever wanted to be. It was prophesied in the tablets at City Hall—well, all right, that verse was _technically_ vague enough to apply to dozens of interns; but it was me, I knew it was me, I always knew it was meant to be me. There was never anything else I could imagine being."

And oh, Carlos knows what that's like, the burden and the thrill of such keen conviction. _'What do you want to be when you grow up, Carlos?'—_ he'd never had but one answer, not since he'd learned the word 'science' at two years old. But he is lucky in his calling—one could be let go from a dozen universities, lose a hundred grants, but even with no tools or colleagues or acknowledgment, one could still be a scientist.

To be the Voice of Night Vale is to be chosen—and then to have that taken away—he cannot imagine it. "Cecil, I am so sorry—you could have my voice, if I could give it to you—"

"You already have, Carlos," Cecil says. "And I didn't lose it; just that, I didn't lose."

Carlos stops, pulls back and grips Cecil's shoulders, to look Cecil in the eyes. "I never gave you my voice...?"

"But you did," Cecil says. He reaches up to cradle Carlos's head in his palm, threads his fingers through Carlos's hair. "At the meeting the first day you arrived in town. You said, _'Call me_ Carlos'"—and the quote is spoken in Cecil's uncannily accurate inflection, every tone so precisely emulated that it brings to Carlos's mind that exact moment from a year and a half ago, a flashbulb memory almost as vivid as reliving it. "Then when I asked if I could quote you, you said, _'Yes, of course—just warn the town, please._ ' You're the only one of all the scientist who ever did give it to me—so few newcomers do."

"Cecil," Carlos says slowly "how are you doing that? With your voice..." Not the Voice—but for a moment Carlos would've sworn—

Cecil cocks his head, bemused. "I told you, I still have you, my Carlos. I remember everything with you—it's useful; there are a lot of gaps, of course, but you've investigated so much in Night Vale, that even all the years before you came, I have an idea what occurred. And you were there when Tamika Flynn emerged from the library, and when the glow cloud appeared, and—"

"I was," Carlos says, "but how do you remember that? Why would you still have me, if no one else? Is it because of our personal relationship—but you're friends with many people—"

"It's because you weren't included the original contract, I expect," Cecil says, in the mildly condescending tone he gets when explaining to Carlos such basic concepts as invisible clock-towers and deadly holidays. "You weren't yet part of Night Vale, when I signed the contract with Station Management; ours was a later arrangement."

Carlos only half-manages to swallow his hysterical giggle, chokes on it and wheezes out, "So—I was subcontracted directly to you—not the Voice of Night Vale, though you were the Voice at the time...?"

And suddenly, with a jolt of revelation as illuminating as a lightning strike, Carlos understands. "Cecil," he starts to say—then stops, because this is untested, unendorsed, and if he is wrong—he cannot torture Cecil with a false chance.

Cecil stares at him as if Carlos's face is a text in hieroglyphics. "Carlos, what is it? You're thinking, I can see you thinking, what—"

Carlos kisses him, sloppy and deep enough to leave Cecil momentarily breathless, speechless, to tell him in the pause, "Cecil, I know this is hard, but I need to go, there's something I need to do—"

"Science?" Cecil asks, not sarcastically but bright, encouraging. "Of course, you're still a scientist—I'd never want you to be anything else. Go, do your experiments."

"I'll send Dana in to keep you company," Carlos says, "and I'll be back as soon as I can. Promise me you'll stay here and rest until I come back, that you won't—you won't do anything?"

"I promise," Cecil swears, looking slightly mystified by Carlos's concern, in a way Carlos finds very reassuring. Cecil is not despairing yet, for all he's lost—his strength of will is also his own, not only the power of the Voice.

Cecil need not despair, if Carlos is right—if Carlos can fix this, can get the Voice of Night Vale back on the air. Can restore Cecil to everything he's meant to be.

"Just hold on, Cecil," Carlos says, and rushes off to try to save the day, like a scientist should.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thanks for all the comments and kudos - this story has eaten my life a bit so I'm anxious to know if it's working outside my own head. <3 I haven't quite finished the first draft but this is nearing the halfway point, I think, so there's definitely more to come!


	4. Chapter 4

Carlos has never addressed the City Council personally before—individual representatives at times, but never the assemblage. But this is his idea.

He discussed the theory with Teddy Williams and Josie and the others, and they supported it, in a hurried way that made Carlos suspect that they'd already reached the same conclusion and had been waiting for him with his imperfect knowledge of local dogma to catch up. Either way, they were quite willing to let him present the plan.

So now here he stands in the center of the Council's bloodstone circle arrayed on the ambulance bay, watching with ill fascination as beads of his own blood drip from his fist. Ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen—one shed for each bloodstone in the circle; then he quickly presses his hand over his cut wrist, slips his index cards out of his sleeve and clears his throat. "Ladies and gent—er, people—er—members of the Council..."

Carlos hasn't been this nervous about a presentation since his doctoral defense; and he'd been a lot more sure of what he was talking about then. Also more sure that the review board wasn't going to reject his thesis by devouring his still-beating heart.

But this is for Cecil—for Cecil, and for all of Night Vale. "Due to StrexCorp's dismissal of the community radio host, Night Vale has no Voice," Carlos says. "Obviously this is—umm—sub-optimal. The host's contract stipulates that any candidate for the position must be approved by the City Council. We—I—would recommend that for the time being you refuse to either accept or reject any applicant put forth by StrexCorp, and instead draw up a brand new contract. For this, I'd suggest a candidate for your consideration: Cecil Gershwin Palmer. He's a Night Vale citizen from birth, has repeatedly demonstrated his dedication to this community, plus—"

 _"Approved,"_ the City Council says in unison.

"—he has extensive, unique experience—" Carlos reads off his index card, then stops. "What?"

" _Approved,_ " the City Council repeats, with the same impatience the others had evinced. " _This will not be as easy as it was; it will take much time and effort, and in the end the danger will be greater than ever, now that those who want to buy us out may better realize what coin they can use. But Night Vale needs a Voice, and if the candidate's willing, he's approved."_

 

* * *

 

Carlos wants to tell Cecil personally, as soon as possible. But it's evening by the time the Council dismisses him from the circle and he's bandaged his arm, and he returns to Cecil's room to find Dana and Josie outside the door, conferring with Teddy Williams. The doctor is giving his professional opinion according to the Night Vale medical standard. Carlos has yet to master interpreting those hoots and rattles, but Josie translates, "Cecil's sleeping now. The City Council plans to start tomorrow morning, and he needs as much rest as he can get."

So Carlos goes back to the lab instead, to verify he has all the equipment he'll need later, and check in on the science team. The bus isn't running, so he calls the robotics engineer Takashi to come pick him up. Takashi is happy to oblige; he takes any chance to take his self-driving car out on the road.

"The roads are pretty empty tonight, huh?" Takashi comments on the ride back, sitting in the driver's seat with his hands tucked behind his head, as the steering wheel turns itself. In anywhere but Night Vale this would attract attention, but Takashi's automobile isn't the only driverless car regularly on the streets. Though his is the only one controlled by a computer, rather than an invisible chauffeur or malevolent animating spirit. "Is the whole town in the hospital? Is it a plague or something? Should we send the biochemists out here?"

"No one's sick, they're there for Cecil," Carlos replies without thinking.

"Cecil—your boyfriend on the radio?" Takashi asks. "What happened, is he okay?"

Carlos looks at his colleague sharply. Takashi isn't the type of man to sell out cheap; but StrexCorp has an advanced robotics research foundation... "He'll be fine," Carlos says. "It was appendicitis."

"Oh, good. It'd be weird, not to hear him on the radio all the time."

Carlos doesn't reply, too busy swallowing what might have been either a sob or a giggle; he's not sure which.

At the lab he answers all inquiries with his own impatient questions about the state of the team's projects, successfully deflecting any information gathering and with luck focusing his colleagues on their own research, rather than StrexCorp's. None of the other scientists have any trouble finding the words they want; none of them seem to notice anything is any different in Night Vale, other than complaining about the local eateries being closed.

Carlos manages to distract himself with his own ongoing experiments for a couple hours, finally calls it quits to head back to his apartment to try to sleep. He'll want to be up early, to be at the hospital before Cecil awakens.

When he starts his car the radio comes on like always, but there's nothing broadcasting now but a soft hiss—not the Special Static Fun Show but plain dead air. On any other night around this time—insofar as 'this time' has any meaning in Night Vale—Cecil would be about to wish the town good night.

Carlos switches off the static. The car sounds strange without the radio playing. Does the engine usually sputter so loudly at thirty? Maybe he should take it into the shop, get it checked out.

The streets are still empty, and, once past the streetlamps in town center, totally dark, the endless utter dark of the desert, scarcely nicked by his car's headlights. Above him arches the Milky Way, a fountain of light against the sky's velvet black. It's a breathtaking sight always, but tonight it's literally so; Carlos feels suffocated by it, smothered by the hushed emptiness around him. Even when he flips on the high beams, they barely pierce the silent night, like trying to butcher an elephant with a straight pin.

Fearing the overwhelming immensity of the universe is a popular town pastime, one that Carlos partook in it himself even before coming to Night Vale, if only recreationally. But he's never felt this insignificant, looking up at a night sky. Usually he can find comfort in the familiarity of constellations, being able to triangulate his own place in the galaxy. Tonight there are too many stars, too bright for him to pick out patterns—so many, and yet they are all so far away, so very far away. The silence of the desert around him is but an echo of the utter silence of the void, a vastness no cry could ever cross.

There is no moon. ...Was there ever a moon? Or did he simply imagine that Earth once had a companion in the dark? It is alone—he is alone, hurtling through endless emptiness, and even the closest star he can see is too far away for him to ever reach, not if he runs for a thousand lifetimes—

"—Doc? Hey, Doc! Carlos!"

It takes Carlos a couple of seconds to recognize the sensation in his ears as sound—it is incomprehensible that there is anything to hear, across the infinity of the void. It takes him another few seconds to recognize the sound as his name, and even longer for him to realize that he is not in outer space between the stars.

He's not sitting in his car, either; he's standing, neck craned to gaze up at the Milky Way's cascade of stars pouring down on him—

Carlos shudders, tears his eyes from the night sky to look at the flatness around him. The shadowy shape of the mesa, black against the starscape, orients him; he is in the sand wastes on the edge of town.

Headlights flash over him, and the voice from before calls out, "Carlos?" Carlos takes a step back as a pickup truck rumbles up and Larry Leroy leans out of the cab, asks, over the classical harpsichord music his MP3 player is blaring, "Hey, Doc, whatcha doing out here?"

Carlos squints at Larry's bearded face through the headlights' glare. "I...I don't know." The chill night wind whips him and he shivers, crosses his arms and realizes he's without a jacket, and barefoot, cold rough sand under his feet.

"Why don't you get in, Doc; I'll give you a lift back to the hospital," Larry offers.

Carlos clambers into the truck, says through chattering teeth, "Th-thanks, you can just t-take me back to my car. It ought to be somewhere in the area..."

Larry steers one-handed to shrug out of his sheepskin-lined jeans jacket, tosses it at Carlos. It smells like livestock and Night Vale's popular mustard-flavored tobacco, but it's warm and Carlos gratefully pulls it around his shivering shoulders. "How about we find your car tomorrow, Doc," Larry remarks, over the chiming harpsichord. "Be easier in daylight."

There's a fizzing click and a nasal voice speaks into the truck, " _Breaker breaker, this is Iron Fist, are you still there?_ "

Larry turns down the music, picks up a CB radio microphone from the dashboard and reports into it, "This is Reluctant Martyr; still here, and I found the scientist. Am bringing him in now."

"You were looking for me?" Carlos asks.

"Looking for anyone out here," Larry says. "The sky's worse than usual tonight—bad luck. We'd likely lose a few people anyway, but now, without the Voice... Though at least most folks are together at the hospital. You just make sure you're not alone, okay, Doc? This isn't the kind of void you can stave off by putting on a TV show or a CD—maybe Bach, or Holst, if you really know what you're doing...what were you listening to in the car?"

"Nothing," Carlos says, "since the radio is..."

Larry takes his eyes off the empty road to gape at Carlos. "Seriously? I thought you were supposed to be a smart guy?" Then he sighs. "Well, guess it's been a while since we've had a presence drill—budget cuts, you know. But I sure hope our kids are better trained than that..."

He drops Carlos off at the hospital with another admonishment about spending the night alone, and drives off before Carlos can return his jacket, or ask about his lost shoes—he'd forgotten he was barefoot until he steps onto the cold asphalt, stinging his sand-blistered soles.

Carlos limps inside to find that the hospital's lobby and ER have been converted into a makeshift emergency shelter, with cots and blankets laid out for people to sleep and sigils on the walls—these in taped-up dot-matrix printouts instead blood. There's also a barbeque, serving food for free. Carlos gets one of the last gila monster burgers, wrapped in a corn tortilla instead of an illegal wheat-based bun. He's developed a taste for ground gila, and it's more reassuringly identifiable than Night Vale hot dogs.

With everyone busy helping one another, Carlos doesn't bother asking for footwear. Really he's too tired to articulate a request anyway. It feels like everyone who sees him spares a second to smile or wave; but none of them actually talk to him, or seem to expect more out of him than a weary nod.

After eating he washes up in one of the men's bathroom sinks, and makes his way through the hospital corridors to Cecil's room in the ICU. In the bed inside the bloodstone circle, Cecil is sound asleep, breathing silently as usual.

A cot has been set up next to the bed. If Carlos were any less exhausted, he thinks he might have cried out of embarrassed gratitude. As it is, he just flops down on the cot, buries his face in the satin-covered pillow.

The darkness behind his eyelids is too dark, though—too absolute, too lonely. Carlos opens his eyes, anxiously looks up. The room has no windows, no visible stars or sky; but he can feel the weight of the void pressing down on the roof, the ceiling tiles buckling—

He blindly reaches out, finds Cecil's hand on the edge of the bed and grasps the warm lax fingers. Cecil doesn't wake, but he mumbles something inarticulate. It might've been Carlos's name, or equally likely a curse in Modified Sumerian.

Either way, it's enough. Carlos shuts his eyes, and sleeps.

 

* * *

 

Dana shakes Carlos awake the next morning. It's still early, he finds, when he leaves Cecil, still sleeping, and stumbles after her out into the corridor. The sunlight through the skylights is the wavering pale of just after dawn. Dana has his shoes, and tells him, "Your car's in the lot, the secret police towed it over." So he's able to change into a fresh lab coat from the trunk, and grab a coffee and a danish, light on the arsenic, from the packed hospital cafeteria.

The atmosphere in the hospital is tense, people ducking their heads to avoid eye-contact, muttering to one another in little cliques. Some of it is merely the discord of having too many people in too close proximity. But there's a more nebulous stress of anticipation. The City Council will be taking the first steps to restoring the Voice of Night Vale this morning, and no one knows for sure if it will even work.

Carlos finds he does not share their worries; having rested and eaten, he feels scruffy but confident. He knows Cecil, maybe better than most. He's also anxious, but to get started, to right this wrong. To have Cecil back, as he should be. For Night Vale, of course, but Carlos is a scientist, honest enough to acknowledge that it's personal as well. He wants his boyfriend back to himself.

When Carlos returns to the ICU, he hears noises inside Cecil's room, and enters without knocking, assuming that the City Council has arrived early to prepare.

Only to stop short when he finds that it's not the Council after all; but Steve Carlsberg, climbing in through a window which Carlos knows for a fact was not there when he woke up. 

Carlos is sufficiently habituated to Night Vale's ambiguous architecture not to be too disoriented. But he pauses long enough that Cecil, roused by the noise, sees the man at the window first.

Cecil sits up in bed, says, "Steve?" Just the given name, not _Steve Carlsberg_ —and not the usual irate snarl, but with a confused, but not upset, surprise.

It takes Carlos aback. Though not as much as Steve Carlsberg, whose face screws up like he's about to scream, or cry. Instead of doing either, he just gasps out, " _Cecil_ —oh gods, Cecil," and stumbles forward to take Cecil by the shoulders, stare him in the eyes. "It's you," Steve says, "it's really you, isn't it—"

"More or less," Cecil says with a shrug and a vague smile. "How are you doing, Steve?"

Carlos doesn't think he actually says anything, but Cecil apparently can hear question marks, because he glances over to the door, sees Carlos and beams, not vaguely at all. "Oh, Carlos, good morning! Have you met my friend Steve? Steve, this is my boyfriend, Carlos—"

Then Cecil frowns, cocks his head. "Oh, you have met, haven't you...?"

"Kind of in passing," Steve Carlsberg says, "with some of their science surveys; but we haven't really been introduced. Hi, Carlos," and he holds out his hand. He's smiling almost as brightly as Cecil. It's disconcerting, as Carlos had sort of thought Steve Carlsberg's mouth had been surgically altered into a permanently suspicious scowl. With his brow unfurrowed he looks younger, around Carlos's age, and with less premature gray.

"Hello," Carlos says, and accepts the offered hand, to have his clasped in both of Steve Carlsberg's and shaken firmly. 

"Whatever you need," Steve Carlsberg tells him, "whatever I can do to help, just ask."

"Thank you?" Carlos says, uncertain.

"Help with what?" Cecil asks.

Steve Carlsberg steadily meets Carlos's eyes, says, "I've got maps; I know multiple ways out of town, off the main roads. If you want me to make a diversion—"

"A diversion?" Carlos repeats, trying to catch up.

"I know the City Council is planning on trying this morning," Steve Carlsberg says. "Do you know when? How much time do we have?"

"Time to do _what_?" Cecil asks, louder.

Steve Carlsberg looks from Carlos to him. "To get you out of here," he says. "Out of Night Vale, before they try to make you back into the Voice."

"What?" Carlos says.

Cecil sits up straighter in bed. "Not this again, Steve," he says firmly. "I have a responsibility to this town; I'm not going anywhere."

"You don't understand, Cecil," Steve Carlsberg says. "It doesn't have to be like this, it shouldn't be—anywhere else, it wouldn't be like this." He looks at Carlos beseechingly. "You're from outside, you understand—you need to tell him what community radio is supposed to be like, what a radio host is supposed to do! It's just a job, out there—and you'll be great at it, Cecil. You won't have to give up your dream, you can still be on the radio. Carlos will help you figure everything out—

"...I will?" Carlos says weakly.

"—we just have to get you out of town. I'm parked right outside the window; can you walk?" Steve Carlsberg goes to take Cecil's arm, pull him out of the bed.

Cecil shrugs him off, says, "Come _on_ , Steve, don't be a jerk—"

"Cecil, _please_ , just listen—"

Before Carlos can intervene, the door slams open and a squad of five secret police officers charge in and tackle Steve Carlsberg, throwing him to the ground and piling on top of him like he'd threatened Cecil with a machine gun and a pair of pliers.

Old Woman Josie hobbles through the door after them. She shakes her head at the man buried under the secret police stack. "You disappoint me, Steve. Just because StrexCorp succeeded where you failed doesn't make this any more right. To take advantage of the town's vulnerability like this—I know what most folks think of you, but I expected better. If you really cared for Cecil—"

"If _you_ really cared for him—!" Steve Carlsberg gasps from under the pile. The secret police yank him, thrashing and struggling, to his feet, to shove him toward the door. Steve Carlsberg fights back, planting his heels on the bloodstone circle. "Carlos, you're his _boyfriend!_ " he cries, locking eyes with Carlos. "If Cecil means anything to you, you can't let them do this! Not now, not like this—do you know how many sacrifices it took the first time, to make the first Voice? The odds are he won't even survive it—if you can call that surviving—just get him out of here, before it's too late! Cecil, please, it's for your own—"

The secret police ram a baton into Steve Carlsberg's stomach, silencing him long enough to drag him out of the room, and the door bangs shut behind them.


	5. Chapter 5

Carlos stares at the shut door, listening to Steve Carlsberg's muffled shouting fade as the secret police take him away.

He turns back when he hears Cecil's breath catch. "Josie," Cecil says, sitting up at the edge of the bed, face drawn and anxious, "can you—I can't go myself, not now, but if you can, tell them not to—it's _Steve_ , Josie, he'd never hurt me, he just refuses to understand—"

Josie sighs. "I'll plead leniency," she says. "And make sure if there is a trial, it stays secret—he's already hated enough; if word got out of what he just tried to do, at a time like this..."

Cecil glances at Carlos. "Also," he adds, "tell the City Council that..."

Josie looks at Carlos as well. "I'll let them know."

She nods to Carlos, a deliberate, meaningful gesture he cannot interpret. Then she shuffles out of the room, shutting the door behind her.

"Carlos," Cecil says once they're alone. The plain name, lacking endearments, makes the hairs on Carlos's neck stand on end. Not just because Cecil's voice is still so flat and hollow, when he's not trying to force feeling into it.

"What did Steve Carlsberg mean, Cecil?" Carlos asks. He has no idea how his own voice is steady; it feels like someone else is talking, his tongue and vocal chords moving independent of his will. "The sacrifices, that you might not survive—do you know what he meant?"

"He doesn't actually _know_ ," Cecil says, almost sulkily. "Sure, Steve might have researched it a bit, when I started interning; but he doesn't really understand anything—"

"Researched what?"

"—We didn't have a summer reading program then; it was completely idiotic for Steve to break into the library—"

"Tell me what he researched, Cecil."

Cecil crosses his arms over his chest. "Night Vale's first Voice, all those generations ago...it took a few tries to get it right. To find the right person for the job—that's usual enough, isn't it? You try out a number of candidates, see who's best qualified—"

"How many people?"

"I don't know, it's been a while since I heard about this—we were just kids, and Steve was ranting all the time, it wasn't like I could listen to everything he said! Maybe a dozen or two? But once they found the Voice—"

"What happened to that dozen or two? The ones who weren't right for the job?" When Cecil doesn't answer, Carlos demands, " _Cecil_."

Cecil's shoulders squirm in an approximation of a shrug. "It's...not exactly clear. It was a long time ago, and the records are spotty. The Council put a ban on writing implements back then, too, for Night Vale's own good. So most of the accounts are what people wrote down years later, all hearsay and heresy by then; and no one's penmanship was improved by a decade of not writing. Besides, nobody wanted to talk about it anyway..."

"You knew this?" Carlos asks. "You remembered this, and you didn't mention it? Even after you'd heard what the plan is—what the City Council—what _I_ told them to do?" He sinks down on the cot by Cecil's bed. "Oh, god, Cecil, I told them—"

"I know!" Cecil beams at him. "My brilliant Carlos, figuring out that we need a new contract, without even knowing any of that history..."

"If it was an even dozen before the Voice was chosen, then that's one in thirteen," Carlos calculates. "Not even an eight percent chance of success. And if there were more..." What had the City Council said— _It will not be as easy as it was—_ "Cecil, you can't do this—you can't risk this, not with those odds—"

Cecil's face falls. "You don't think I'm right for the job?"

"It's not that—you were an amazing Voice of Night Vale, but this isn't a _job_ , Cecil, it's your life—maybe your very existence!"

"Amazing?" Cecil's expression brightens again like a lightswitch was flipped. "You really think I was?"

"That's irrelevant! Steve Carlsberg was right, you have to get out of here—"

"Leave Night Vale?"

That stops Carlos short. He has never actually considered this possibility before now. He'd known better than to ask Cecil not to do his show, but he'd at least contemplated it. This, though..." _Can_ you leave, Cecil? Permanently, I mean, not just a trip abroad, but could you move elsewhere?"

"Not before," Cecil says. "The Voice of Night Vale could hardly come from outside Night Vale, could it? Now, though...is that what you want, Carlos? You want to leave, find a new city to live in?"

Carlos freezes. "I..."

"I wonder if I could," Cecil says, thoughtfully. "If you came with me, and we could make a new home, together...if you really want to leave..."

"What I want has nothing to do with this!" Carlos cries. "This isn't about me, this is about what you want—this is about _your life_ —"

"So you _do_ want to be here!" Cecil completely misses the point, grinning joyfully. "Oh, Carlos, I knew you must—I don't think I could love Night Vale this much myself, if you didn't love it so—"

Carlos chokes. Correlation does not imply causation—he still doesn't know which way the influence flows. If Cecil still has _his_ voice—if Cecil is speaking Carlos's own reckless irrational love for Night Vale and all it's given him, its fascinating scientific conundrums to unravel, and its Voice... "Cecil," he says, almost gasping, "you can't—you shouldn't do this, you can't risk this, not for me. Of anyone in Night Vale, not me—"

"Why not?" Cecil asks, genuinely puzzled. "You're my boyfriend; and part of making a relationship work is compromise, doing what's best for both of you, instead of just yourself."

"Compromises are deciding whether to live in the city or the suburbs, or where to go for dinner or what movie to see—not this! And this isn't what I want, not for you—"

"So what do you want?" Cecil asks. "For me to leave Night Vale alone, without you?"

It feels like a lump of ice the size of a fist is lodged in Carlos's stomach. "Cecil, I would—I could go with you, we could live together, somewhere else—but it wouldn't be what you'd think. You don't know who I was, what kind of man I was, outside of Night Vale."

"I know who you are," Cecil says, and even if he's not the Voice, that statement is absolute.

"StrexCorp almost hired me," Carlos says.

Cecil tilts his head blankly.

"They offered," Carlos says. "They were courting me, expensive restaurants, tours of their facilities. And I knew, I knew what StrexCorp does. I'd seen the exposés, I'd read the petitions. I knew what they do with science, what they'd do with my research—weapons, environmental exploitation, social engineering, all of it. But to have access to their labs, their privatized research—what did I care about secondary effects? Any information can be employed for good purposes, or bad; it isn't a scientist's job to worry about how the knowledge they gather might be used. I was going to sign on, join StrexCorp R&D. It could've been me, Cecil, researching Night Vale for them; it could've been me, running this experiment, to see how the Voice of Night Vale could be manipulated, how that power might be controlled..."

"But it isn't you," Cecil says. When he puts his hand on Carlos's shoulder, Carlos shudders; but Cecil doesn't lift it, a warm steady pressure bearing down on Carlos, grounding him. "So why didn't you sign on, in the end?"

Carlos laughs. It hurts his throat. "Because the morning I woke up to make the call and accept their offer, I got an email that a grant proposal of mine had been accepted. Enthusiastically—the original offer had been tripled. It was enough for me to assemble a team bigger than StrexCorp had offered. That was all that decided it; I got a better opportunity. And Cecil, I told the StrexCorp VP negotiating with me all about it—I wanted to see if StrexCorp would increase their offer. I told them about the grant, the study I'd planned of Night Vale.

"I have no idea if Night Vale was on their radar, before that. I don't know if Strex would ever have heard of this place, if they hadn't been following my research. For all I know they traced the grant through all the dummy corporations—I'm no financial wizard, but from what I've been able to figure out, we're being funded by the Night Vale City Council. If it's town money it should be on the public record of course, but Night Vale doesn't always work like that..."

"Because they wanted you—we wanted you," Cecil says, smiling. "Before you ever came to town, before we ever even saw you, we knew we needed you here."

Carlos vaguely thinks that this ought to terrify him, more than comfort. "Or maybe they feared what I would do for StrexCorp, and buying me off was their best option. It doesn't matter why, Cecil. Coming here, living in Night Vale, meeting you...I'm not who I was. And I don't think that you'd really care for the man I am outside of Night Vale."

Even as he says it, he wonders, as he has before, whether it's just that he had to change, to survive Night Vale's unreal reality. Because it was harder to tell himself that the consequences of his science don't matter, when he knows those consequences by name; when he sees his knowledge save their lives, their minds, their very existences. When he sees as well the cost of failure, when he does not work fast enough, think fast enough; when he cannot solve a puzzle in time.

Or was it that reality itself which changed him? Carlos remembers Cecil on the radio, his first day in town— _"and everything about him was perfect."_ Even the Voice of Night Vale could not make so great a lie into truth—but maybe it drew reality a little closer, as that voice drew in all its listeners.

At the same time, Carlos remembers sitting on the hood of his car in the Arby's parking lot with Cecil next to him, not saying anything. Waiting in silence for Carlos to touch him. For Carlos to decide. He remembers Cecil on the radio, _"Sometimes people just don't call, and that's okay."_ And for all the times Cecil spilled his own heart over the airwaves, he never presumed to articulate what Carlos might or might not feel about him; he never put words into Carlos's mouth, not about that.

Whatever made him this way, the man Carlos is now cannot do less for Cecil than Cecil has done for him.

"You need to go, Cecil," Carlos says. "I'll come with you, if you won't go otherwise; but what matters is that you leave Night Vale—that you can be whoever you are outside of this place. StrexCorp won't come after you, I'll make sure you're hidden. And you can still be a radio host; Steve Carlsberg is right, with your voice you could find a job in any city you'd like—"

"No," and Cecil smiles, beatifically certain. "I don't want to leave here, or make you leave. I want to be Night Vale's Voice again, as I'm supposed to be."

"You might not succeed in becoming the Voice—you might not be anything at all!"

"It's not as dangerous as you think," Cecil says. "I already know I'm right for the job; I've had it for years."

"This is different," Carlos says. "Making a new contract—anything is harder when it's started from scratch; and the first Voice, how big was Night Vale then? Likely only a few hundred people—"

"But I'm not starting from scratch!" Cecil takes Carlos's hand, turns it up to press a kiss into the palm. "I have my dear Carlos."

Carlos pulls his hand away—gently, but Cecil still looks distressed, as he lets go. "What if you didn't have me?" Carlos asks. "What if I revoked my consent?"

Cecil goes silent, stock-still, staring at Carlos.

"Could I do that?" Carlos asks. "If I did, would it release you?"

"You could." Cecil's lips barely move; his voice is not even a whisper. "And it would."

"Then you'd have yourself entirely to yourself," Carlos says. "Maybe then you'd realize how valuable that self is—how valuable _you_ are, Cecil, not because of what you can do for Night Vale, or what you mean to me..."

Cecil wouldn't remember him anymore, probably wouldn't listen to him—but Carlos could call his friend Steve Carlsberg, have him come and explain. Explain everything that Cecil's younger self hadn't yet understood about what he wanted to be, the danger of trying, and the cost of success. This time Cecil might be convinced, especially once he heard about other opportunities, other radio stations, all the other communities in the world that could use his voice, and not ask or take any more from him than time and effort.

 _Whatever you decide, most of us will understand,_ Josie had told Carlos. The denizens of Night Vale cared for Cecil, after all he had done for them; they would let him take this chance. All Carlos has to do is say the words—

"No—Carlos, please, no." Cecil raises his hand to press one finger lightly over Carlos's lips, not enough to muzzle him, but pleading. His eyes are wide, but they're not fearful, just so sad. "Please, you said you loved me—I won't remember you, not at all—"

Carlos catches Cecil's hand, traps it between his own. "I know," he says. "I know, but I can't be that selfish. If this is what I have to do, to save you—"

"Oh, my Carlos, you don't know who you want to save," Cecil says miserably. "You heard that cassette tape—I was an intern. I _chose_ to be an intern."

"Yes?" Carlos says, when Cecil stops there. "You loved radio; of course you would—"

"'To the family of Leland'," Cecil says, in an ineffective approximation of his announcer's voice. "Of Stacey, Richard, of Dylan—and those are only the interns you know about, since you arrived. They always have families, don't they. Wouldn't it be easier if they didn't? We're not wanting for orphans, in Night Vale."

"That's not your fault," Carlos says. "They all chose to work at the station, you didn't—"

Cecil shakes his head. "No, you don't understand. _I_ had a family, Carlos. I had to, to be an intern—every intern has family in Night Vale. Competition is fierce; you need connections to get the job. I had a family, and I chose to be an intern—and I survived. I became the Voice of Night Vale."

"...And now you don't have a family," Carlos says, because Cecil may now remember his brother's name, his mother's face; but neither has come to the hospital, has come to see him. "Cecil, what happened to them? Your mother, your brother..."

"I don't know," Cecil says. "Or I don't remember—I don't know if I want to remember. But my mother covered every mirror in the house, and I—I think I was the one who uncovered them. I loved working at the station, it was all I'd ever thought it would be, all I ever wanted—"

"Do you remember uncovering the mirrors?" Carlos asks. "On the cassette tape, you said you didn't know who'd done it."

"Who else would it have been?"

"The Faceless Old Woman? Or the secret police—it could've been anyone." Night Vale needed its Voice; once Cecil had been chosen... "Besides, you didn't know—you were just a kid, you had no idea—"

"Does it matter?" Cecil asks. "Whether I knew, or just guessed, or didn't have a clue—they're not back now, are they? My mother or my brother..."

"...No. Not that I've seen," Carlos says. "Cecil, I'm so sorry..."

"I don't miss them," Cecil says. His eyes are closed and his voice is even emptier, no more life than words printed on a page. "I remember them clearly, now; but I don't miss them...but I'd miss you, Carlos. Even if I didn't remember you at all. And I'd miss Night Vale, no matter how far from it I went."

Carlos doesn't know how to answer, other than to intertwine his fingers with Cecil's, feel Cecil grip back.

"I don't want to know who I am outside of Night Vale," Cecil says, opening his eyes to meet Carlos's, still unafraid. "I don't want to know who I am without you. I want to stay here, with you. I want to be the Voice of Night Vale again—do for everyone what they've done for me, do my best to give back what they've all entrusted to me for all these years. I have to try, Carlos; even if I can't succeed, I have to try. If you really love me, you'll let me."

"I could be letting you die—"

"You'll be letting me live," Cecil says, and the certainty in his voice resonates in Carlos's very bones.

Carlos wonders if he could even do it—could refuse Cecil, when Cecil speaks like this. If he doesn't, if he allows Cecil to proceed—is it because he's honoring Cecil's wishes, out of love and respect? Or does Carlos have no choice, only the illusion of it?

Correlation or causation, cause and effect. Cecil still has him, if no one else; Carlos is still subject to Cecil's voice, by his own will.

Or else Cecil is subject to Carlos's will, Carlos's own selfish need of him. He fell in love with Cecil the Voice of Night Vale; even now, Cecil Palmer's baritone sounds to his ears like an echo, a hollow facsimile of what it should be.

Which cause preceded which effect? Does he love Cecil because Cecil loved him, told him so in Night Vale's Voice? Or does Cecil love him so because Carlos loves him, because Carlos gave him his voice and with it got himself a Voice, to speak for him in words more real than anything else in Night Vale?

Or maybe it isn't about Night Vale or Night Vale's Voice. Maybe this is just how love works, given and returned until there's no way to determine where it really started, a closed feedback loop, the effect its own cause.

The quiet knock from outside startles Carlos; he jumps, eyes darting to the door, then the window. It's still here for the moment, a tacit offer of escape. "Cecil," he says hurriedly, clasping Cecil's shoulders, "are you sure? If you want to leave—I'll go with you, I'll stay with you, wherever you want to go, I promise—"

The door opens, and Carlos snaps his mouth shut as Dana slips into the room. She's moving quietly, furtive, as if she's not supposed to be here.

She looks at them, at Carlos pulling away from Cecil, too late to be innocent; and smiles.

Then she squares her shoulders, faces Cecil and says, not insistently, but with conviction such that her resolve cannot be doubted, "I can do this, Cecil. With what I've been through, at the station and in the dog park and afterwards—I have the breadth and the force and the scope. And I signed the old contract. I'm ready."

"I know," Cecil says, "I know you are."

He glances at Carlos. Carlos barely registers it. There's a chill down his spine, paralyzing him. He should have realized this, too; he knows that Cecil already had. Night Vale needs a Voice, whether Cecil is here or not. 

And Dana was an intern. She has a family in Night Vale, a mother and a brother waiting for her to come home, who still remember her, who she still remembers.

Cecil smiles at him, softly—not vague, but gentle. "I don't want to go anywhere, Carlos. I'm sure."

Then Cecil takes Dana's hand, tells her, "Thank you, Dana, but that won't be necessary. But you're the first choice if this doesn't work."

Dana nods, accepting. Carlos can't tell if she's relieved or disappointed, but she sounds sincere, when she says, "Thank you, Cecil." She leans over to kiss his cheek. "Good luck. I'll tell the City Council you're ready, okay?"

"You do that," Cecil agrees, and Dana nods, smiles again at Carlos and leaves the room.

"Even if this does work," Carlos says, "StrexCorp may come after you again. It won't be safe—"

Cecil actually laughs at that, someone else's laugh, an alien noise in his mouth. "Dear Carlos, if you wanted _safe_ you should never have been born to begin with. Much less come to Night Vale."

"I want _you_ to be safe."

"No, you want me to be here," Cecil corrects in his too-light baritone. He takes Carlos's hands to draw him closer; changes his voice, pitching it a little lower, a little more meaningful, to ask, "Do you miss me, Carlos?"

Cecil is sitting before him, gazing into Carlos's eyes, holding his hands. Anywhere but Night Vale, the question would make no sense.

Here, though, Carlos has to look down, and finally, guiltily, admit, "Yes, I miss you."

Cecil cups his face, smooths his thumb over Carlos's cheekbone. "I'll be back soon. With you, with everybody."

There is another knock on the door, three evenly spaced raps. Carlos thinks it's just his imagination, that they sound ominous; but Cecil says surely, "That's the City Council."

Carlos rocks forward, kisses him. Cecil returns it, hesitant and eager, familiar and strange at once, sucking on Carlos's lower lip with a desperate, yearning pleasure as they break apart.

Carlos presses his forehead to Cecil's, breathes across his cheek, "I'll miss you, too, Cecil Gershwin Palmer," and he feels Cecil shiver at the sound of his name.

"I'll still be here," Cecil murmurs back. "I'm a citizen of Night Vale, too—it's my Voice as much as anybody's."

Then the door opens, and the City Council enters.


	6. Chapter 6

Carlos was expecting the contract to be written in calligraphy on goat-hide parchment, to be signed in blood. Or else a three-inch-thick binder of painstakingly typed and footnoted clauses, with a dozen pages to date and initial.

But the City Council have no papers at all. In retrospect, Carlos realizes that it only makes sense that the Voice of Night Vale would work under a verbal contract.

The City Council members surround Cecil's bed, standing on the bloodstone circle. It's much smaller than the one outside the hospital; the council members are almost shoulder-to-shoulder. From the doorway, Teddy Williams watches, arms folded.

Carlos asked if he should leave, but Cecil won't relinquish his grip on his hand. And the City Council doesn't seem to notice him. Once in place around the circle, the council members raise their heads to look at Cecil. Cecil returns their gazes, turning his head to look at each one in turn, steadily, as if memorizing their faces. After he's taken in the whole circle, he states in a plain, clear voice, "I am Cecil Gershwin Palmer, and I will be the Voice of Night Vale."

Cecil's baritone is even, his face is calm. The only hint that he's bracing himself is his fingers tightening around Carlos's.

The City Council speaks in unison. " _You, Cecil, are our Voice. You can quote us on that. And anything else."_

They fall silent. "Is—is that all?" Carlos asks.

Then Cecil gasps. His hand spasms in Carlos's, squeezing hard enough to bruise. His mouth opens and his throat is working, but no words come out, just a choked wheeze.

There is a disturbance in the air over Cecil's parted lips—faintly shimmering like a heat mirage, a coiling, writhing, flowing _something_. Carlos cannot help himself; he reaches out for it, but his fingers only pass through empty air.

Cecil gags again, and then his head is thrown back as his spine arches in a paroxysm, like he's been hit with a massive electric shock. "Cecil!" Carlos cries, as Cecil convulses once, then goes abruptly, terrifyingly limp. He collapses back on the hospital bed, his hand slipping out of Carlos's.

He's not breathing, Carlos realizes. He's about to initiate CPR when Teddy Williams shoulders past him with professional brusqueness. He has a surprisingly normal stethoscope, which he applies to Cecil's chest and throat and ears—one of those things is not like the other, Carlos thinks, half-hysterically, reaching around the physician to clutch Cecil's limp hand.

Cecil abruptly coughs, gasps, chest heaving as he sucks in air.

Teddy Williams glances around at the watching City Council, and gives a thumbs' up.

Cecil is panting shallowly; his forehead is spotted with sweat and his eyes and teeth are both clenched tightly shut. His hand in Carlos's is ice cold. "Cecil," Carlos says, "Cecil, can you hear me, are you—"

"Hear you," Cecil wheezes, his voice so scratchy and hoarse he might have been whispering. He doesn't open his eyes, but his fingers move in Carlos's. "D-dear Carlos..."

Teddy Williams taps Carlos on the shoulder. He's holding an open notebook, with a message scrawled in colorful block letters—crayons are a gray area in the writing implements ban. He gestures at the notebook meaningfully, then points at Cecil.

Carlos reads off the note, "'Cecil, you should take a few hours to recover your strength, before you continue.'"

Cecil forces his eyes open with effort. "One hour," he grates, "will be fine."

Teddy Williams elaborately rolls his eyes and shrugs a clear, _'Whatever, be that way'_.

The City Council step back from the bloodstone circle and file out of the room along with the physician. The last council member stops in the doorway to say, echoed by the others from the hall, " _Good to have you back, Cecil!_ "

Cecil smiles and waves feebly, his hand flopping on the mattress. His head lolls against the propped-up pillow like he doesn't have the strength to lift it and his arm at the same time.

"Cecil," Carlos says, "how do you feel? Your throat, your voice..." _Not be as easy_ , the City Council had said; and Carlos had put together that with what Teddy and Josie had discussed, what Steve Carlsberg had insisted; but he hadn't quite added up to this total, to a price this visceral, this literal.

"M'fine," Cecil says. His voice is still hoarse and slurred with fatigue, but it's richer, somehow—or else Carlos is imagining it, that's there's a tiny bit more to it than there was. "Must do more, everyone, soon as possible, we don't..."

He trails off. By the slowing of his silent breathing Cecil thinks he's fallen asleep. He remains as still and quiet as possible, to not disturb him; but then Cecil takes a louder breath. "Carlos?" he says, anxious.

"I'm right here," Carlos says, resting a reassuring hand on Cecil's arm.

"You need to—you should go start that now; if you can't—"

"It's all right," Carlos says. He's got a part to play in this yet, but it's minor, especially compared to Cecil's. "It won't take me long; I've built one before, I have everything I need in the lab." He'll have to cannibalize some of their scientific equipment, but they can always requisition more. Better that than place separate orders and risk giving anything away to StrexCorp. And mysteriously lost equipment is hardly an unusual event in Night Vale.

Cecil sighs, calmed. "Beautiful, brilliant Carlos, what would we do without you?"

"Without me, you likely wouldn't have to do any of this," Carlos says, then winces when Cecil opens his eyes, struggles to sit up. He puts his arm across Cecil's chest to bar him from rising. "No, don't, you don't have to—"

"It isn't your fault," Cecil says. "I wouldn't care even if it were; but it _isn't_ ," and his acute, enunciated cadence is the voice on the radio, or almost; not quite the Voice, but its echo, like a recording of a live show.

Cold sweat is beading on Cecil's forehead again; his breathing is hitched and shallow and his fingers dig into the mattress, and Carlos says, a little panicked, "Okay, okay, it's not my fault," trying to sound like he's convinced, like his blamelessness is a reality he accepts. "Just rest now, Cecil, we can talk about this later."

Cecil looks at him with tired but heartfelt concern, but in the end only says, "Wake me in half an hour?" and Carlos is guilty enough to promise.

Half an hour sitting beside Cecil, straining to listen to his too-quiet breathing, does little for the guilt. Carlos debates going back to the lab, getting some measuring equipment. He could call and ask for things to be brought over, but he doesn't want any of his colleagues coming to the hospital, not when he doesn't know who might be reporting back to StrexCorp. Still, he'd give a lot for a photoacoustic laser, a microwave resonator, a psychokinetic energy meter—even a sensitive microphone would give him basic readings, something to go on besides his inadequate senses. 

He doubts the City Council would approve, but they're not here now and Carlos doesn't really care. He wants a scientific way to monitor this process, a way to verify it's working. That the strain on Cecil won't be too great—though for measurements to mean anything, he'd need a baseline and an estimate of physical capacity, and right now Carlos wishes at least one of his degrees had anything to do with biology. His understanding of Cecil's current condition isn't much more advanced than knowing that continued respiration is a good thing.

Not that he's positive that a working knowledge of typical human physiology would help him understand Cecil's now, or for that matter Cecil at any other time. But at least it would provide more variables for him to mull over.

Thirty-five minutes pass in such musing before Carlos notices and guiltily shakes Cecil awake. Cecil is groggy and slow to rouse, even worse than he usually is in the morning. Carlos is about to consider his agreement fulfilled and let Cecil go back to sleep for as long as he wants when there's a knock on the door.

Cecil starts up like an unheard siren went off in his ear, rubbing bloodshot eyes like he's trying to detach his heavy eyelids. "I'm ready," he calls before Carlos can stop him. "Come in."

The door opens to admit Teddy Williams, followed by Mayor Pamela Winchell and her staff. Unlike the City Council, they don't take positions on the bloodstone circle, but just stand in a clump at the foot of Cecil's hospital bed. The staff look unsettled. Mayor Winchell might, too; Carlos isn't sure. He's never been able to read her facial expressions, and has yet to figure out if that's a failing in her or in himself.

Cecil watches them expectantly, waiting. They watch him back. After a moment, Carlos clears his throat, asks, "So, um, are you going to...?"

"The mayor doesn't need to go anywhere!" Trish Hidge proclaims. "The mayor is everywhere and nowhere, reflected equally in a single puddle as in a broad sea, and goes—ow!" The last exclamation is due to the heel of Teddy William's bowling shoe coming down on her foot. The physician frowns and gestures at Cecil, who's wincing like her strident voice is more jarring than nails on a chalkboard.

Pamela Winchell narrows her eyes, works her lips silently like she's priming an engine, then says, "As the Voice of Night Vale, I expect you to express my words with honesty, and gravitas, and the shining silver glint of a sharpened blade edge. I expect the Mayor's words to _always_ be expressed with honesty, gravitas, and the glint of a sharpened blade edge."

"Yes!" Trish Hidge nods. "Mine too, my words, like that!"

"Me, too!" chimes in another aide, and then all of them are clamoring, "Me, too, me too!" like kids being picked for a recess game.

Carlos doesn't have a chance to consider that, though, or even to hope that the blade edge bit is a metaphor and not literal—Cecil is shuddering, choking again on empty air and will and words. Teddy Williams monitors as Carlos holds onto him. This time Carlos has the presence of mind, when Cecil stops breathing, to count seconds in his head, _one Mississippi two Mississippi three—_

At _fifteen_ Cecil finally gasps his next breath—he'd be three miles away if he were a lightning strike, and Carlos inhales himself, drops his head to press his forehead to Cecil's cold hand. He thinks it was shorter this time, but that could be wishful thinking, or the reassurance of hard numbers. Even if time doesn't work in Night Vale—right now Carlos will take what he can get.

He feels Cecil's hand come to rest on his head, shaky fingers carding through his hair, and looks up into Cecil's weary, worried eyes.

Teddy Williams taps Carlos on the shoulder, holding up the notebook, but before Carlos can read the page Cecil rasps out, "Just go ahead now, Teddy; it'll be easier."

The physician frowns at him askance, but says, "You're the Voice, and you can have mine, when needed."

The seizure is definitely shorter this time; Carlos only gets to the ninth _Mississippi_ when Cecil inhales. His eyes are glassy, not quite focusing, as he blinks at Teddy Williams and wheezes, "By the way, don't you have a tiny hostile power to be keeping an eye on?"

"I short-circuited the pin retrieval machine in lane five, that should hold 'em for now," Teddy says. "I was going to tell you, it's likely slightly less of a strain to contract individually. At least with people who don't have the privilege to demand immediate access," and he shoots a sour glance at the mayor and her minions at the foot of the bed.

Cecil nods, letting his head fall back on the pillow. Carlos hears _individually_ and his grip involuntarily tightens around Cecil's wrist. 

Twelve or more failed candidates, the first time Night Vale got a Voice, and how much smaller was the town then; how many fewer citizens needed to pledge their voices?

"How long before you're ready for the next?" Teddy Williams asks.

Carlos wants to say _never_. He doesn't; he doesn't say anything, as Cecil inhales like he's trying to drink oxygen instead of breathe it, and says, "Now's good; send them in."

Next is the Sheriff and two of his deputies. They're all in leather balaclavas and cloaks over their body armor hiding any sheriff's stars, so Carlos isn't clear which is which; but they're willing to take turns. Each says the same thing through their vocoder: "You are the Voice of the people, and we're the fists of the people; we all speak for all."

After them come four agents from a vague yet menacing government agency, followed by representatives from the Night Vale City Works, the Transit Authority, and the Department of Parks and Creation.

By the time they're done pledging, Cecil's teeth are gritted like he's bitten down on consciousness and that's the only thing keeping it from fleeing. But when Carlos suggests he take a break, maybe a nap, Cecil pulls enough of his ragged awareness together to focus on Carlos. His throat sounds as raw as if he's been screaming, as he rasps, "Carlos, you don't need to be here for this. There must be science you should be doing, I don't want to keep you—"

"Would this be easier on you, if you were alone with those you're, um, subcontracting?" Carlos asks him. "Or would you rather have somebody here with you?"

Cecil wavers—literally as well as figuratively; he's trembling in erratic vibrations, like he's the only one who can experience the constant tremors Carlos's seismology equipment records. Metaphorically, Carlos can see honesty clashing against concern in Cecil's eyes. It being Cecil, honesty wins. "I'd rather have you here."

"Then I'm staying here," Carlos says.

"Can you do something for me, then?" Cecil asks. "Can you go get Old Woman Josie, ask her to come and talk to me? None of them but Teddy knows her that well, I'm missing her..."

So Carlos goes to find Josie. There are lines in the hall outside the ICU, Night Vale citizens standing or squatting on the floor in rows, chatting and fidgeting, for all the world like people waiting at the DMV or a bank. Carlos estimates a hundred people in the lines he can see; then he stops counting.

The secret police are directing the queuing, in what seems to be a specific order. Nearest to the door are Big Rico, the Night Vale school superintendent, Marcus Vansten—business owners, managers, directors, the more influential people in town. Carlos could ask how they're determining who goes first, but he doesn't want to think about it. Doesn't want to think about each of them going into Cecil's room, offering their contract and Cecil will choke it down, drowning in air, lungs stopping until maybe they won't start again...

Josie is sitting in the hospital cafeteria, playing gin rummy with Becky Canterbury and a deck of tarot cards, some of which appear to be bleeding, or else oozing tree sap. She sets her hand down on the table as soon as she sees Carlos, before he can tell her Cecil's request, and accepts Carlos's arm to help her stand, her fingers latching on with the strength of a vulture's talons. Though when Carlos doesn't quite hide his wince, she relaxes her grip.

"Excuse me," she mutters, as he helps her out of the cafeteria. "I couldn't find my cane, when John came to pick me up. Haven't had to use it for a while; the angels were always there to give me a hand."

Carlos pauses; it takes him a moment to realize he's waiting for Josie to add that angels aren't real. But she doesn't. Instead she asks, "So how is Cecil?"

"Determined," Carlos says. "Stubborn. Strong."

Josie's eyes on him are rheumy but keen. "Not all right, though."

"No," Carlos says. "He's not all right; he's—" He can feel the torrent of jumbled, panicked words in his throat, shuts his mouth on them to spare Josie his meltdown. After a moment he asks instead, "So, I've been meaning to ask, how long—" he hastily changes it to something which can be more easily answered in Night Vale, "how do you know Cecil, anyway? Before he was on the radio, I mean?"

"Here and there," Josie says. "I used to babysit him."

That's a mental image bizarre enough to make Carlos momentarily lose track of his fears. "Really?"

"No," Josie says. 

"...Oh."

"Who can actually say what's real, what's not, when you're talking about the past that exists only in memories and mementos?" Josie continues, in such a manner that Carlos can't tell if she's serious. In Night Vale it's generally safer to take everything at face value, so he just nods.

A few people outside the ICU frown at them for jumping the lines, but the secret police nod to Carlos and let him and Josie pass. Teddy Williams is standing outside the door to Cecil's room, expression foreboding and arms crossed over his chest. Carlos's own chest feels like a horse just trampled it, seeing him. "Why are you out here—did something happen to Cecil?"

The physician shakes his head. "No, I was just kicked out for this one."

"For this—?"

The door to Cecil's room opens, and a hooded figure glides out. Then another, and another—maybe several more; Carlos loses track, when they all look identical and some might be circling back into the room, or else vanishing—not in a puff of smoke, but like looking at them through the wrong end of a telescope; they're further away, then farther yet. Then there is only one left, standing in the corridor—Carlos thinks it's one of the pair who were in the diagnostic room yesterday, though he's not sure why or how he could tell.

The figure doesn't speak, but it does nod its hooded head back towards Cecil's room with idle vexation, a sort of, _Are you going to deal with this, already?_

"Don't know why they butted in," Teddy Williams mutters, "when they don't speak to anybody anyway—"

Carlos ignores him, rushing through the door to see Cecil on the hospital bed, with the sheets ripped off and strewn on the floor. Cecil is curled on his side with his arms wrapped over his head, as if he's trying to hide within himself.

"Cecil?" Carlos asks, and knows he's heard by the shudder that runs through Cecil's shoulders. Josie, behind him, murmurs an oath in an unknown language. "Cecil?" Carlos says again, desperately, but for all the terror cracking his voice open, Cecil doesn't respond.


	7. Chapter 7

"Cecil?" Carlos says again. Cecil is visibly trembling; when Carlos touches his exposed neck, his skin is damp but cold, like he's been bathed in ice water. He's shivering in fitful spurts—not just shock, but later stage hypothermia, Carlos recognizes from that disastrous ski trip his freshman year of college. 

The hospital might have equipment, heating packs and electric blankets; but there's a more expedient solution at hand and Carlos doesn't think further than that, just climbs into the bed and wraps himself around Cecil's cold body. The thin hospital gown allows for body heat transfer, and Carlos rubs Cecil's freezing arms to get his circulation going again.

A weight settles over his shoulders—a heavy quilted blanket, which Teddy Williams tucks in place around Carlos and Cecil both with clinical attention. Carlos belated recalls the company, peers past the physician to Josie, who has seated herself on the cot by the bed. She gives Carlos a level, rather dry look, like two grown men spooning on a narrow hospital bed in a bloodstone circle is something she sees every day.

Carlos finds himself wondering if Josie has any photos from her time babysitting. He suspects from his mental disconnect that that he might be in some stage or other of shock himself. But Cecil in his arms was shivering more and now is shivering less as he warms up; and Carlos can feel him breathing, not steadily but constantly at least. "Cecil?"

" _The forgiven do not walk the earth but rise above it; every footstep in the mud falls as an unaccepted apology to the ground,_ " Cecil says. His voice is bass-deep and throbbing in a way that makes the hairs on the back of Carlos's neck stand on end. After a year and a half he thought he knew most of Night Vale, but he doesn't recognize this.

"Can you hear me?" he pleads, wrapping his arms around Cecil's shoulders.

Cecil shrugs him off, struggles to sit up. His eyes are open but glazed and his expression is blank, as if every conscious fiber of him is focused on speaking. "The Mayor makes no mistakes," he says, now inflected in the stiffly formal tone of public announcements. "Prepare our town for war."

"Cecil—"

"The diseased body must be cleansed. Foreign elements must be removed from the system by the antibodies of the law, before the organs of government are poisoned—"

" _Shush_." Josie reaches out and presses her wrinkled hand over Cecil's mouth, muzzling him. He tries to twist away but she holds fast to his shoulder with her other hand, stares into his unseeing eyes and says, "Cecil, you're the Voice—the best Voice that Night Vale's ever had, and I've always been happy to have you speaking for me. So will Erika, whenever they come back."

She nods firmly, then lifts her hand from Cecil's mouth. Before he can speak again he's choking. Carlos, arms around him, can feel him seize, feel the coughs racking his body when he finally breathes again. He holds onto Cecil until Cecil is holding on to him in turn, clutching at Carlos's arms, gasping out, "Carlos?" Cecil gives his head a shake. "Josie?"

Josie reaches out and taps the side of Cecil's head, a little too lightly to be a cuff. "Don't get lost, boy, or else we'll lose you. And make sure you're balanced—no reporter should rely on official sources only. You're the Voice of Night Vale, not the voice of authority."

"Yes—yes," Cecil says, rasping and hoarse, "but I'm not, not yet, and they won't—"

"They'll listen to you," Josie says. "They don't have a choice." She points at Teddy Williams. "You, go get the police, they can track down whoever he wants next."

As the physician leaves, she turns back to level a gimlet stare at Carlos. "I'm sorry," Carlos stammers, in answer to the accusation he thinks he sees in her eyes. "I didn't—I should've—"

"Carlos," Cecil interrupts, twisting around in Carlos's arms, peering at him so closely that their noses bump. His voice is still hoarse, but gaining strength and timbre with every word. "This isn't your fault; you don't need to apologize for any of it." He turns his head back to Josie, says petulantly, "And you shouldn't encourage him. He's had too much guilt already; he'll spoil his appetite for depression or humiliation if he indulges in much more." 

Josie looks at Carlos and sighs. "I've noticed."

"It's part of being a scientist, I think," Cecil says, lowering his voice in a way that might have been confidential if he weren't sitting in Carlos's arms.

"I'm right here," Carlos says. "And it isn't—well, ethical responsibility is part of being a scientist; but none of this has much to do with science at all, that's the _problem_ —"

"Sounds to me like this can't be your fault, then," Josie says. "If you're a scientist, and it's not to do with science."

"But if I wasn't," Carlos says, "if I were something else, someone who could actually help you now—"

"You couldn't," Cecil says, and husky as his voice is, there are definitely layers to it now that were absent before. It's not persuasive or insistent so much as descriptive, as if explaining something so obvious it can't be misunderstood. "Because if you weren't a scientist, you wouldn't be my Carlos. And you couldn't help me more than you are now, being here."

"Cecil..." Carlos says helplessly. He looks at Josie but the old woman just raises her eyebrows at him, as if to let him know that if he wants to contradict the Voice of Night Vale, he's on his own.

Cecil raises a shaky hand to touch Carlos's cheek, rest their heads together. "I'm not going to get lost," Cecil breathes over his lips. "Not when I have you to come back to."

Carlos wants to make him promise. Wants to demand a guarantee, but he was a scientist long before he came to Night Vale; he knows the realities of existence. There is nothing with a one hundred percent probability; there is no way to absolutely prove a hypothesis, only disprove. Cecil is not the Voice yet; Carlos doesn't know if his odds are better now, or worse, or unchanged from what they were. Maybe taking contracts gets easier with practice, or maybe it's worse every time, more of a strain.

Either way, if the only thing he can do now is be here for Cecil, then Carlos isn't going anywhere.

Teddy Williams brings in a few secret police officers, and Cecil dispatches them to summon his choice of Night Vale citizens to speak to next. These include twelve-year-old Tamika Flynn and a couple lieutenants of her middle-school militia, Leann Hart out of Cecil's respect for fellow journalists, John Peters—you know, the farmer—and Steve Carlsberg. 

The others all arrive promptly, but Steve Carlsberg is no longer on the hospital grounds, the police report to Cecil. Cecil takes the officers' contracts, along with Tamika's terse, "Tell our truth, Voice," and Leann's glowering, "If it must be spoken instead of printed, then your Voice should speak it," and John's calm, "Reckon there ain't no Voice of Night Vale for me, except for you." All of them watch with respectful composure as their affirmations are forced down Cecil's throat, and Carlos counts the seconds before Cecil finally starts breathing again.

Then Marcus Vansten bribes someone to get through the door, and then Big Rico uses his size to bull his way inside, and after that Carlos loses track. They all say it differently, everyone who enters the hospital room and stands at the foot of Cecil's bed at the edge of the bloodstone circle; they all give different pledges in their different voices, but their faces all look the same, full of hope and readiness and confidence, and more.

They believe in Cecil, every one of them. More than that, they love him. Carlos can see himself in all of them, his own feeling reflected in all their eyes.

And Cecil loves all of them back, every citizen of Night Vale who he spoke for, who he wants to speak for again. He might not know all of them now as clearly as once he did; but it doesn't change how he feels.

Carlos can't be jealous; this isn't something it's possible to be jealous of. It would be as absurd as a single drop of rain envying a river for carving the Grand Canyon. Besides, it isn't as if he hasn't always known this about Cecil; he'd heard it in every _good night_ Cecil said to Night Vale, wishing the best for every night no matter what the day brought. 

Twelve or twice that many candidates, the first time Night Vale's Voice was contracted; maybe it took that many to find someone with a heart big enough to hold an entire town. With a heart strong enough to bear all the suffering of that town—because Cecil speaks not only the living's words, but also the requiems for the dead. He does not often name those who have fallen; but he must have known them all, every one of their lost voices an irrevocable part of himself.

Or maybe it takes more literal cardiovascular strength. Cecil's eyes are ringed with dark fatigue; his lips are gray-tinged and paler than his face, and his hand in Carlos's is cold and won't warm, no matter how much Carlos chafes it between his palms. Carlos wonders if maybe it's better he has no medical training; if this would be more frightening still if he could catalogue and quantify the physiological risks.

Until Night Vale he never thought that the known could be more terrifying than the unknown. He's learned a lot here.

When Cecil falls asleep after contracting Madeline LaFleur—or passes out; Carlos isn't sure, and doesn't want to disturb him to find out—Carlos shoos the tourism director out of the room, then wedges a plastic chair under the door handle to bar anyone else from entering. There are some pounding and shouts on the other side, but not enough to wake Cecil, and they stop in a few minutes.

Cecil is shivering in his sleep. Carlos goes to the closet, finds another blanket and spreads it over him, then takes off his lab coat and tosses it on as well. Then he sits on the cot by the bed, puts his head in his hands and listens to his own harsh breathing echoing in his ears. There's a tightness in his chest that reminds him of the asthma he outgrew when he was ten. He only manages to force it quiet by telling himself that it might wake up Cecil.

In a while there's a quieter knock on the door, and a soft voice on the other side asks, "Carlos? Can I come in? The secret police are outside the hall, keeping everyone away; it's just me."

Carlos listens closely to verify this, then moves the chair and opens the door. 

Dana was telling the truth; she's standing alone.

"Cecil's asleep," Carlos says. His voice sounds as rasping as Cecil's, though he hasn't been the one choking down the voices of an entire town. "You can't talk to him."

"That's okay," Dana says. "I wanted to know, have you had dinner yet? The cafeteria's serving it now."

Carlos stares at her, dredging his brain for the meaning of 'dinner' and 'cafeteria'. It takes worrisomely long for him to remember, and ask, "Shouldn't lunch come first?" Time doesn't work in Night Vale, but meals tend to be more dependable. Most days of the month, anyway. "I didn't think it was a second Tuesday..."

"It's not," Dana says. "You can have lunch if you want, there are sandwiches. Or have lunch and dinner together? But you should eat something. I can watch Cecil—"

Carlos almost closes the door on her, but Dana puts up her hand to stop him, promising, "I won't say a word to him, if he wakes up, I swear."

So Carlos sidles through police cordon outside the ICU and goes to the cafeteria. It's still crowded, but the clumps and cliques of people have broken up; everyone is squeezed shoulder-to-shoulder at the tables, but focusing on their food, not making eye contact with those they sit with. There's little conversation, just the squelching, churning sounds of many mouths chewing and swallowing; it's almost like a few of the more popular shows that play on the night-time radio.

Carlos adds to that noise—penchant for chewing louder than preferred and all—without registering what he's eating. He hardly notices when the quiet concerto of mastication is interrupted by the meaty thuds of blows on flesh. Not until the entire table he's sitting at is flipped over, sending his tray flying with it.

Carlos shoves his chair back, staring at the upside-down table in bemusement. It's being trampled by a knot of men, grown adults but brawling like schoolboys. One has an impressive pair of ram horns amid his curly red hair, which he uses to butt his opponent in the chest. The man retaliates by pulling out a full-sized bullwhip, its crack echoing against the tile floor.

By the time the secret police arrive to break them up, more fights have started, some physical, others verbal, raising a dissonant cacophony. Carlos claps his hands over his ears—he's not the only one, he sees, as he maneuvers around the chaos to the exit. Anyone not embroiled in a row stand scattered among the fighters with their hands over their ears, looking miserable and confused and alone.

Carlos can't help but feel guilty, indulgent or not, as he makes his escape. The fighting has spread to the hall, and the shouts are starting to gain the pitched tenor of a riot. But Carlos has no mob managing skills, and the secret police have a surfeit of gear for the occasion. 

No one's breached the ICU, at least, and Cecil's room is far enough from the cafeteria that once he's shuts the door, Carlos can't hear any echo of the fighting.

Dana looks up from her phone when he enters, smiles at him; but it's dim and strained. She looks tired, if not Cecil's frightening exhaustion; and tense, even as she reassures Carlos, "It's all right, he didn't wake up."

Carlos looks at Cecil, lying on the bed, slack and unmoving, sunken eyes closed. He's not shivering, at least, and his lips have a little more color. Carlos sits on the cot next to Dana—more collapses, his legs folding under him. He reaches out, takes Cecil's limp hand in both of his. It's still cool but no longer icy. "I'm not made for this," he finds himself saying inanely.

Dana peers at him with sudden curiosity. "You were made? How? In a laboratory?"

Carlos shakes his head. "No, I mean—I'm not—scientists aren't... I became a scientist because I wanted to understand _everything_. Everything I could possibly understand; and anything I knew I'd never understand, I didn't care about. It didn't mean anything me. Except now I'm here, in Night Vale, and everything, all the science I knew before, is meaningless—time doesn't work here, cause and effect are a bust. So I don't understand anything. But I care about all of it. And I can't—I don't know how..."

Dana puts her hand over Carlos's and Cecil's, her palm dry and warm.

"You're still here," Carlos says to Dana, staring at Cecil, at his chest rising and falling in minute increments. "So does Night Vale still need you?"

Dana doesn't lift her hand. "Maybe," she says. "Depending on how this goes."

Depending on whether Cecil will keep breathing. "There was a fight in the cafeteria," Carlos says.

"There've been several today. Sorry, I should've warned you."

Carlos swallows. "There isn't much time, is there. Before it all falls apart—before this community fractures into too many pieces to be rebuilt. Whether or not it has a Voice."

"Time isn't real," Dana says. "And we're not that fragile. Not quite yet." Her hand tightens over Carlos's. "Cecil's not fragile, either."

"I know," Carlos says. "I'd never have gotten the chance to meet him if he was. But this is..."

He trails off. Dana doesn't try to fill in what he's missing, just holds their hands, until Cecil's breath catches, soft but obvious in their silence.

Dana jumps to her feet before Carlos can say anything. She leans down to give him a quick peck on the cheek, then vanishes out the door before Cecil's eyes flutter open.

"Who—who's there?" Cecil asks.

"Just me, Cecil," Carlos says.

Cecil blinks a few more times, doggedly, then gives up and lets his eyelids close again. "Carlos," he sighs. "I was...dreaming? Or remembering...I think I was remembering..."

He trails off and Carlos thinks he's fallen back asleep, but then Cecil says, "In Luftnarp—he told me his name. That beautiful, ashen boy...we spoke. We laughed a rattling laugh together. His skin was so cool and smooth, but his breath was warm in my ear...I think that might have been my last chance. I could have stayed. If I'd never gotten back on the bus...but it's too late now. He probably doesn't remember my name at all..."

"What was his name?" Carlos asks. "I can write it down—then you'd have it, if you ever wanted to find him again."

Cecil turns his head on the pillow toward Carlos, drags open his eyes. "Dear Carlos, you know writing implements are illegal."

"Then I'll record it on my phone and print it out later, before the glow cloud erases it. Cecil, anything you still remember now, anything you want to remember—his name, your mother's, your brother's—I can keep it all for you, so you don't lose it again."

"Paper and ink has no memory," Cecil says. "Any words can be written on a page. —Not that print is dead," he adds, and his inflection briefly takes on Leann Hart's tenacity—"but it's not real, either."

"Real or not, you don't have to lose anything you want to remember."

"There isn't anything," Cecil says, and smiles. "I don't need to remember what's right here." He squeezes Carlos's hand. "Can you go bring in whoever's waiting next?"

Carlos swallows, forces a calm smile as he caresses Cecil's brow in a way he hopes is soothing. "It's late, everyone's probably asleep anyway. You can wait until tomorrow, just rest now—"

"If it's late, that's perfect for our nocturnal citizens," Cecil says. "Some of them might be up in the ER rafters; just shine a flashlight and they'll come down."

"Later," Carlos says, and deliberately lets himself yawn. "I'm tired, too, I was just going to sleep myself."

It doesn't quite work; Cecil's brow draws up in worry, but he says, "Maybe you should move to another room, then? I don't want the noise to keep you up, you look exhausted—still lovely, of course, the bags under your eyes accentuate their rich depths; but—"

" _I_ look—Cecil, you can hardly even sit up—!"

"I don't need to sit up to listen," Cecil says. "And I still need to hear from most of the town—"

"Haven't you heard enough?" Carlos asks desperately. "You've met with just about everyone you quote regularly, the most important people in Night Vale, isn't that enough—"

"I quote who's important in a story. Anyone can have a story, so there's no way to know who that will be, until there is a story. And how would I know when there's a story at all, if I don't hear from everyone?"

It's so very rightly egalitarian that Carlos wants to throw up. In daylight, well-rested and unafraid, he might agree. He isn't strong enough now. "You could decide it. You could say this is enough, and they'd have to listen; you're their Voice—you don't have to risk yourself any further—"

Cecil smiles, checked by fatigue but sincere. "My sweet Carlos, are you worried about me?"

"I'm not _worried_ —not concerned, either. Frightened. Terrified. Horrified, and it's got nothing to do with guilt. And don't tell me to go do science because I can't, I couldn't concentrate, not knowing what you're doing, that it could—that you could...if I'd known it would be like this—" Carlos is out of air, gulps in a breath and sees Cecil's face and the heartbreak there stops him short.

"I'm sorry," Cecil says. "This isn't...of course it would be horrifying, to witness the inception—"

"I'm not frightened of you," Carlos says. "I'm frightened for you. Not of you becoming the Voice; I know the Voice, I know you. But Cecil, if you can't—I don't want Night Vale to have any Voice but you; I don't know how I'll stand it, if you don't—"

" _No_ ," Cecil gasps. His hand clenches around Carlos's so hard that the knuckles whiten, his eyes widening in round staring dread. "Carlos, you can't. You have to stay; Night Vale needs you. The Voice of Night Vale will need you, whoever it is—"

"I'll stay," Carlos says. "Cecil, I'm not leaving town, I promise." Cecil is shaking, and Carlos slides onto the narrow bed, wraps his arms around Cecil and pulls him to his chest, presses a kiss to the top of his head and says into Cecil's hair, "Night Vale is my home now; I'll do whatever I can for it. For everybody. For as long as I can, if I'm needed. I swear. But I can't...home or not, I don't know if I could love Night Vale anymore, if it takes you from me."

Cecil tenses, then relaxes in Carlos's arms; or perhaps he just doesn't have the strength to hold himself taut. "Oh," he says, abruptly calm. "Okay. I understand that."

_"Curse this town, that saw Carlos die_ , _"_ Carlos remembers hearing, lying on the slick bowling alley floor with his lab coat wet and his chest aching. He wonders suddenly, if he had not been rescued, if the Voice of Night Vale had no cause to relinquish that grief and rage...who had the Apache Tracker really sacrificed himself to save, in the end?

Maybe there is a necessary reason for the Voice of Night Vale not to have a family. Carlos wonders if his transgressions are even deeper than he knows. "Cecil, does the Voice usually have a boyfriend?"

"Usually?" Cecil echoes. "You mean, did I have other boyfriends before I met you—are you jealous, Carlos?"

"Not that, not just you. Is the Voice usually allowed to have, um, lovers? Or spouses? Or any committed relationships—beyond the relationships inherent in being the Voice, of course..."

"It's not that that it's not allowed," Cecil says. "That wasn't in the contract. Just that the Voice usually doesn't, I suppose? Leonard didn't, that I know of. Most people are a little awkward about dating, you know," and he modestly coughs, "a local celebrity."

"A celebrity," Carlos says shakily. "Right." 

"But you're at least as much a celebrity as me!" Cecil says, so candidly cheerful that Carlos's heart feels squeezed, his chest too small to hold it.

He doesn't even point out how much of said celebrity had been drummed up by Cecil's broadcasts. He just kisses Cecil's temple, mutters against it, "I love you."

It's a measure of Cecil's exhaustion that he doesn't return the kiss, only turns enough to press his face into the crook of Carlos's neck, and murmurs back, "Love you, too."

If Night Vale really loved him, Carlos thinks, it would stop time here and now, with Cecil still alive and safe in his arms. Instead it freezes for only a too-short minute; then Cecil says, "Now, I know you'd love to ask more questions for science, and I'd love to answer them; but you need to go tell everyone that I'm awake."

"Cecil—"

"Carlos," Cecil cuts him off, and the weakness of his body slumped against Carlos is in direct inversion to the firmness of his voice. "My loving, caring Carlos, I'd rest longer if I could; but there are so many, and time is short."

"Time isn't real," Carlos says. "This is Night Vale."

"For now," Cecil says. "You didn't hear the radio today, did you?"

"The radio? I assume it's still dead air. There isn't anybody at the station, is there?"

Cecil tilts his head toward the bedstand. Of course it has a radio, as most rooms in Night Vale do, this one a cheap Walkman knockoff with labels in cuneiform. Carlos's curiosity gets the better of him; he reaches over to switch it on.

The sound is turned low, barely audible, but the voice which seeps from the tinny speakers is light and cheerfully encouraging. And vaguely familiar, though definitely not Cecil's, nor any of his interns, that Carlos recalls. _"Welcome to Night Vale's Community Radio; please stay tuned for an important announcement about our future programming! But first—"_

Then he hears StrexCorp's slogans and his stomach twists, threatens to eject whatever he'd put in it in the cafeteria. He slams his hand down on the radio to cut it off.

"That's been broadcasting all day," Cecil says. Carlos doesn't bother asking how he knows. "It repeats every quarter hour; I'm pretty sure it's a recording. I hope it was. If they actually have someone in the studio already..."

"They can't, not yet; but that won't last," Carlos says, dull with understanding. "Strex has an army of lawyers; they'll find a way around the contract, to employ a new host..." And if they can dominate the airwaves, reach everyone not yet contracted to Night Vale's Voice... "There really isn't time, is there."

"I'm sorry," Cecil says. "I wish we had longer, but I have to do my best. For Night Vale."

"I know." It's a paradox, Carlos thinks, that he can love Night Vale this much and hate Night Vale this much, at the same time, in the same heartbeat. Anywhere else, the opposing forces would tear his psyche apart; but contradiction has become his way of life. He feels strained and aching but he can kiss Cecil without shattering, breathing in the heat of Cecil's mouth, Cecil's scent under the stale sterile hospital odors. 

Then Carlos lets him go, and goes to bring the rest of Night Vale to their Voice.


	8. Chapter 8

The people waiting outside the ICU climb to their feet when they see Carlos, their faces set in anticipation. Ignoring most of them, Carlos waves over Larry Leroy. He isn't at the front of the line, but with nightfall he'll be getting out to the sand wastes patrol again, and he'll need any help he can get.

The citizens nearer to the door shoot him cross looks, but nobody tries to argue his choice. Carlos wonders if that's more out of respect, or sympathy. Or possibly because between his wrinkled lab coat and the three days' growth on his chin, they suspect that Carlos the scientist has been replaced by a violent vagrant, and are wisely keeping their distance.

In Cecil's room, Larry touches the brim of his baseball cap in greeting and states with calm purpose, "You're the Voice of Night Vale, and I'll be happy to have you back speaking for me."

Carlos stands by the bed, his hand on Cecil's shoulder to brace him through the seven seconds his lungs stop. As soon as Cecil regains his breath, he tells Larry, "Okay—please ask the next person in line to come in?"

"Got it," Larry nods. "And Cecil—thanks for this. From all of us." He knuckles his cap's brim again.

Cecil grins back at him, all too sincere. "No problem," he says.

Carlos fetches Larry's jacket from the cot, stops him at the door to hand it over. He can't manage a smile himself, but he gets out, "Thank you. For the rescue."

Larry gives him a casual salute as well. "Any time, Doc," he says. "We're lucky to have you." 

Before Carlos can find an answer to that, Larry is gone, and Harrison Kip from the community college enters to address Cecil. Then Frances Donaldson, and after her the next citizen, and the next, and the next after that.

Time may not be real in Night Vale, but Carlos has rarely experienced its abstraction firsthand. But every second Cecil isn't breathing now stretches longer than an hour, Carlos's own breath held until his lungs ache from it; while minutes go by in the blink of an eye, so that Carlos can barely keep track of who's in the hospital room now, who's pledging to their Voice. He's met more of them than not, should know their faces and names; but the figures and voices blur into a continuous shifting form, like a time-lapsed video, too brief to identify anyone. 

And what would be hours in a normal time stream are taking days to pass. Carlos's eyes feel like fire ants are nesting under his lids; there's a ringing in his ears he recalls from grad school, final papers finished in three sleepless nights with the help of his roommate's ADD medication.

Carlos stops looking at the citizens standing at the foot of the bed, stops listening to their pledges. He only sees Cecil, only hears Cecil breathe, as Cecil listens to them all, one by one by one. He's attentive and devout, thanking his visitors for what they inflict upon him, asking for more. Sometimes Teddy Williams is there, checking Cecil over and frowning, but never interrupting the ever-shifting stream of people. Sometimes when there's no one else in the room but Carlos, Cecil's eyes drift close, mouth falling slack; but then at the opening of the door he always wrenches his eyelids back open, forces his lips to smile at Carlos, weak and wan but certain. When Cecil's cold hand tightens around his, Carlos can't tell if it's for Cecil's sake, or Carlos's own.

Cecil flags and falters but keeps recovering without losing consciousness, finding new reserves of strength in cycles too convoluted for Carlos's tired mind to track. Maybe it's cosmic, astrological, a confluence of planets and stars drawing him up and into their orbits; or maybe it's quantum fluctuation, the chaos of uncertainty producing energy from nothingness.

The silent seconds it takes Cecil to breathe again are getting fewer, by Carlos's count; but they take increasingly longer to end, the stretched impossibility of falling into a black hole. Eventually the end will never come, time itself crystallized into one eternal unchanging moment, a silence lasting forever.

No force can escape such a pull; no scientific principle can start time again, once it's stopped. All Carlos can do is keep holding onto Cecil's hand, so that when he passes that event horizon, he won't face eternity alone.

In the end, Carlos folds before Cecil does. Carlos doesn't realize when it happens; he just gradually becomes aware that it is now quiet, and his eyes are closed, and there is a reddish glow piercing the lids.

Prying them open, he squints into the new dawn light shining through the reappeared window. He is sitting awkwardly on the edge of the cot, slumped leaning on Cecil's bed with his head in his arms, pressed against Cecil's side.

Cecil is asleep himself, his silent breaths coming slow but even, keeping measured, regular time. And perhaps it's only the kindness of the sunlight, that his lips seem to have more color than waxy gray, that his closed eyes look less sunken and his cheeks less gaunt. 

One of his hands is still clutched in Carlos's. The other rests on Carlos's head, curled in Carlos's hair. Carlos forces open his cramped fingers to release Cecil's hand, carefully untangles Cecil's fingers from his locks as he lifts his head, his spine protesting.

The scrape of the door opening breaks the early morning peace, and Carlos bites off his curse before it wakes Cecil. Though when he convinces his stiff neck to turn, it's not another citizen come to offer their contract, but Old Woman Josie.

"Not awake yet?" she whispers, tipping her chin at Cecil.

Carlos shakes his head. "How many are waiting now?" he asks, keeping his voice as low.

"A few; more as people wake up. But the greater part have spoken and have gone home. He should easily be able to finish hearing from everyone who can come to the hospital today," Josie says.

"What?" Carlos knuckles his bleary eyes as if he can prod his brain into gear. "How is that possible? I thought most of the town was here..." One minute, on average, for a single citizen to enter and speak and leave; and there aren't even a thousand minutes in a twelve hour night. Even if he drops the estimate to thirty seconds, it can't possibly account for the majority of Night Vale's population.

"It was a long night," Josie says. "As long as it needed to be. Difficult as that was for you both." She puts her hand on Carlos's shoulder. "I came here to tell you that Dana won't be talking to the Voice in person. I've been looking all over the hospital, but she's not here anymore; and when the reception desk tried to call her, the phone melted."

"—Melted?"

"She's gone again," Josie says. "Night Vale won't be needing her at this juncture, it seems."

"Oh," Carlos says. He blinks hard, manages to keep his stinging eyes clear but his voice is thick when he says, "Cecil will be sorry. Especially since he didn't get to say goodbye."

Josie nods.

Carlos looks at Cecil, asleep but breathing, then drops his face into his hands and asks the blackness behind his eyelids, "Then how awful a person am I, to be glad?"

Josie squeezes his shoulder, talon fingers digging in, as if to hold him back from that darkness. " _You_ can be glad," she says. "As Dana herself is, I'm sure, wherever she is now."

"Dana?" Cecil mumbles. "Is Dana here?"

"No, not now, Cecil," Carlos says. He raises his head to see Cecil sitting up under his own power, rubbing sleep from his eyes.

Carlos stares at him. Awake, Cecil looks still more changed. The same man, and yet utterly more recognizable. It's like watching a movie of a sunrise, in HD and color-corrected, thinking it beautiful until the morning you go outside and see how dark the night and bright the sun and vast the sky truly are, and realize there's no comparison. 

"Cecil?" Carlos asks, hesitant.

Cecil's smile is blinding. "Carlos, good morning! Oh, and Josie, good morning to you, too!" Then he blinks under Carlos's stare, elation dimming. "Is something the matter?"

"N-no, nothing," Carlos stammers. "How do you feel?"

"Rather improved," Cecil says, yawning and stretching. "Much more like myself. I think it'll be all right for Teddy to go back to the bowling alley."

"Let's see what his medical opinion is first," Carlos says, gathering himself.

Cecil nods agreeably. "And perhaps I can get a change of clothes, and move to a different room—it's not very professional, to be meeting people in bed. Even if radio is an audio medium, it can send quite the wrong impression about how seriously I'm taking this job."

"I think everyone understands the extenuating circumstances here," Carlos says. "And you look fine, given those circumstances."

Cecil's smile is fond but slightly condescending. "That's sweet of you to say, dear Carlos, but this is hardly your area of expertise—you don't ever have to worry about looking your best. Most of us don't naturally look so perfect."

Carlos looks down at his wrinkled lab coat, at the drool stain on the sleeve, the rest of which probably is caked in his emerging beard. He can't actually remember when he last showered, and he doesn't need a mirror to know his hair is sticking up in directions that don't even exist outside of Night Vale. 

In desperation he turns to Josie, who leers back at him, more wickedly than anyone who cohabitated with angels should. "You know what they say," she says. "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder—"

"—so should only be extracted by licensed optometrists," Cecil says. "But Josie, can you honestly say that Carlos isn't the perfect image of a scientist?"

Josie looks at Carlos again, and snorts. "The boy's got a point," she says to Carlos.

"I think I'm offended on behalf of my entire discipline," Carlos says wryly, and then, "Cecil, wait—!" as Cecil flips off the satin sheets and climbs out of his hospital bed.

Carlos jumps to his side, but Cecil is mostly steady on his feet, keeping one hand on the bed frame for balance as he draws himself up with as much dignity as a man wearing a lavender hospital gown can manage. Even in Night Vale, that isn't much; but then Cecil states, "I'll be more effective if I can look people in the eye," and the expert confidence in his voice makes the rest superfluous.

Carlos shakes his head. "I could never be as perfect a scientist as you are for the radio," he says without thinking, then hears the actual words and tries to correct, "—not that you could _only_ be on radio, I'm sure you'd be wonderful on TV—or live obviously—if you wanted to be—I didn't—I mean, I like how you look—"

"Carlos," Cecil says, touching Carlos's cheek to turn their faces together, " _thank you_." He kisses Carlos, tender and assiduous and passionate, and Carlos feels his own knees almost give out, because this is _Cecil_ , absolutely and irrefutable.

Cecil puts his arms around Carlos, either to hold himself up or because he's noticed Carlos's own instability, attentive as always. He breaks the kiss, gently, keeps his arms looped around Carlos's waist but leans back just far enough for Carlos to be able to focus on his beaming face, and says, "Hi."

"Hi," Carlos says back, aware that he sounds like an idiot but not able to care. Not if Cecil doesn't.

Sometime during this odd not-quite-a-reunion, Josie leaves and comes back with Teddy Williams. The physician applies his stethoscope to Cecil's chest and throat, then ears and lips. He takes Cecil's blood pressure and pulse, and plucks three hairs from his head, before cooing like a giant pigeon in bowling shoes. Josie relates that the diagnosis is positive, and Teddy confirms, in plain English instead of Night Vale medical jargon, that Cecil is recuperating nicely.

Then, to Carlos's surprise, Teddy advances on him with the stethoscope as well, pushes Carlos down on the cot and all but forces an examination. He plucks seven hairs instead of three (Cecil protests louder than Carlos himself) and spends an inordinate amount of time examining Carlos's upper lip and right index fingernail under a green pen light. At last he barks his diagnosis, adding for Carlos's benefit, "You'll pull through, but be sure to eat and sleep extra for the next week. It'll be easier on you now than the Voice has more than half the town to call on; any further risk should be minimal."

" _Risk_?" Cecil repeats, before Carlos can ask himself. Cecil's face is thunderous and there's a basso fury thrumming in that single word.

It's undercut by Josie clucking her tongue like Cecil is a testy toddler. "You knew you kept his voice, Cecil. Did you really think that you could have him right there beside you and not draw on it? Doubt you could've pulled this off if he hadn't given you all you needed."

"But knowing he was there for me—that was enough—that _should_ have been..." Cecil's anger slips and there's anguish underneath, enough to lay to rest any doubts Carlos might have had about Cecil's own awareness.

Carlos doesn't have the strength himself to be angry; it's just one more half-formed hypothesis confirmed. He sits beside Cecil on the bed, puts an arm around him and says, "It's all right, Cecil. It was my choice to stay, and it all worked out. I'm fine. We're fine."

Cecil clings back to him for a moment, whispers into Carlos's ear, "I'm sorry." Then he lets go, almost too quickly, pushing apart as if he fears prolonged contact with Carlos. "You should go to your lab," he says. "Or back to your place to sleep—"

Carlos stifles a yawn with effort. "I'm okay here."

"You said we should find out what Teddy's medical opinion was," Cecil says stubbornly. "And he says you should get extra rest—shouldn't he, Teddy?"

Cecil employs accurate logic rarely enough that Carlos doesn't have a good defense for it. And even less of one for Cecil looking at him with such concerned caring.

In the end they compromise. The station's current interns fetch Cecil a change of clothes from his apartment while he washes up in the hospital's bathroom. And Carlos drives back to his place long enough to grab breakfast, shower and shave. He nicks his chin on the blunt disposable razor and doesn't come out nearly as put-together as Cecil, who, by the time Carlos gets back to the hospital, looks suitably groomed for an interview on national television. Though the admiring way Cecil looks him up and down makes Carlos feel like he could manage such an interview himself, even without notecards.

Cecil is also given new accommodations in the general care ward, a bigger room, well-appointed. The sigils on the walls are cast in polished metals, and the circle's bloodstones are tastefully integrated into the floor's tile design. In addition to a hospital bed, there's also a pair of armchairs, a fireplace, and the mounted head of an animal that's one antler short of being a stag.

Noticing Carlos's surprise, Cecil explains, "Marcus Vansten arranged the room for his first heart attack. I can borrow it unless he has a second attack right now; but I don't think he'd be so inconsiderate."

Still too enervated to stand for long, Cecil takes a seat in one of the armchairs, which Carlos isn't sure is that much more professional than taking callers from a hospital bed. But then, the Voice of Night Vale isn't comparable to any profession outside of the town; and Cecil sitting in an armchair by a fireplace has a weird congruity, the patronizing comfort of some old-fashioned Christmas story.

This effect is amplified when his first visitors are Ms. Robespierre's third grade class, bussed over from Night Vale Elementary. The kids—the majority appear to be human children, anyway—all file into the room, where their teacher shows them by example, saying, "As the Voice of Night Vale, you can have my voice."

Cecil inhales deeply—but he doesn't choke or seize, and though his exhalation after is shaky, his smile is firmly positive, as the teacher nudges forward some of Night Vale's youngest citizens.

He's really very good with them, bolstering the bolder kids with questions and dares, patiently encouraging the shyer ones, his voice warm and lively. The children call him "Mr. Cecil" and pledge to him in high clear voices. Carlos hears Cecil catch his breath after every one, sees him grip the chair's arms; but he keeps his smile easy and doesn't scare the kids.

By the time they finish, the whole class adores him, and Cecil is looking tired but pleased. He likes children, Carlos realizes, thinking this is something he should've known already, from the PTA meetings Cecil personally attended, from the science corner and his reporting of Tamika Flynn. Carlos wonders how much of that is that they're Night Vale's future, and how much is Cecil himself.

He wonders if any Voices of Night Vale had children—wonders if the contract allowed it. Romantic trysts are one thing, but a child? Likely not; they couldn't risk a parent choosing their offspring over the town.

"Carlos," Cecil says, once the students have been herded out, "you promised to rest, once you'd seen that I can handle it now. And the bed is right here; you'll still be close. I'll wake you if anything happens."

So Carlos takes the bed. Luckily there's a curtain to draw, so he can sit up and listen without Cecil being any the wiser.

The sheets are spider-silk, however, and the mattress is just the right firmness to unlock his aching back when he relaxes into it. And Cecil's baritone is steady, evocative even when murmuring meaningless greetings and courtesies. Carlos closes his eyes to better hear it...

He rouses an indeterminate time later to Cecil saying, "—is wonderful, dear Carlos, though if you snore any louder you'll distract the—"

"Whazzathuh?" Carlos rolls over to see Cecil sitting on the edge of the bed, smiling down at him dotingly. "I was snoring?"

"Entirely perfect snores," Cecil assures. "You're so good at sleeping, Carlos!"

"You're trying too hard," Carlos informs his boyfriend as he sits up, running his hand over his hair to try to smooth it down—a lost cause, after sleeping on it damp.

Cecil just grins at him, unrepentant and a little manic, like all the energy drained from him these previous days is back all at once, overflowing. "Sorry to wake you, but it's lunchtime; you should go get something to eat. Doctor's orders, you know."

As comfortable as the bed is, Carlos is hungry, when he thinks about it. "Can you come? Or else what would you like me to bring you?"

Cecil shakes his head. "Nothing for me yet—that's not what my mouth's for now. I'm already cheating, drinking water; I can't risk more."

"You mean you're not eating at all?"

"Oh, Carlos, is gratuitous worrying part of being a scientist, too?" Cecil says. "You don't need to—even if it does make such distinguished wrinkles in your brow. I'd never have made Weird Scout if I couldn't get the basic seven-days-of-fasting badge, and for that you're only allowed salt water. Teddy insists I have a whole glass of fresh water a day now, so this hardly counts. But _you_ have to eat."

"Cecil—"

"Dear, distressed Carlos," Cecil says, kissing his aforementioned wrinkled forehead. "How about, when the contract is complete, you cook for me? You can make me one of your mother's delicious recipes."

"Or I could make one of your mother's," Carlos offers. "What was your favorite food, growing up?"

Cecil's own brow furrows. "You know, I'm not sure. Pizza, maybe? Once Big Rico's opened, they were definitely one of my favorite places."

"What about at home, though? Did your mother ever make you dinner? Or could your brother cook?"

"...My brother?" Cecil cocks his head, his gaze unfocused, turned inward. "Did I have a brother after all...? Maybe I was just making that up..." He shrugs, his eyes tracking back to Carlos's as his smile returns. "I'm afraid can't recall. My mother's cooking wasn't as memorable as yours, anyway!"

He's so guilelessly, unconcernedly sincere that Carlos thanks him for the compliment by rote. He feels numb, a hollow ache in his gut unrelated to hunger.

Going to lunch assuages it a little—not the food itself, but sitting in the cafeteria, listening to the babble of people around him. While the corridor outside Cecil's room is still lined with waiting townsfolk, the rest of the hospital is much less crowded, and between the space and their successes, the atmosphere is friendly, almost festive. People keep stopping Carlos in the hall to shake his hand; at the cafeteria they usher him ahead of them in line, and call him over to their tables. "So how's it going?" they ask him, and "Will we be able to get announcements again soon?" and "My turn is coming up, right?" and no one seems to mind when Carlos only mumbles in reply. Though they do listen up when Jeremy Godfrey claims college-level fluency in Noncommittal Mutters.

Cecil is taking contracts when Carlos gets back, the lines outside the room dwindling. Avoiding the treacherous bed, Carlos sits in the other armchair instead, but it's no good; he nods off halfway through the seventh grade class.

When he wakes up again it's dark outside the skylight, and Cecil is talking on his phone. "Dana! Dana? Is that you?"

 _"No, it's Dana, Cecil_ ," Carlos hears, faintly. _"I'm calling while I can, to tell you that of course you're the Voice of Night Vale, and as long as I'm here, you can speak for me."_

Cecil only loses his breath for a moment, and doesn't take time to catch it, just gasps out, "Thank you, Dana—it was so good to see you! I hope I can again, soon."

 _"Yes, that would be nice, but really I'm just hoping I can see you again soon, Cecil,"_ Dana replies, and then Cecil's phone spurts static, sparks, and turns itself inside out, the battery and circuit-boards exposed on the plastic casing.

Cecil carefully sets it aside and turns to Carlos, smiling wistfully. "I wish I could've heard from her in person," he says. "But still, at least she got through for that much. Always look on the bright side, until it burns your eyes out of their sockets, right?"

Carlos stretches. His back is stiff but he feels more together than he has in days. Looking around the empty room, he asks, "Should I go see who's next in line?"

Cecil shakes his head. "There's no one; I've heard from everyone who can come."

"So you're done?" After everything, it feels anticlimactic.

But Cecil shakes his head again. "The hospital isn't accessible to everyone in Night Vale. And I can't miss anyone—no one should have to face the desert, or the void, or StrexCorp, alone."

Even after all they've been through, Carlos shivers at how plainly Cecil says it, his momentary calm ousted. They're winning this battle, but the war against Strex is barely begun. And Carlos is a scientist, not a soldier. He doesn't know how he survived the past few days; he doubts he has the strength or the courage for what might come.

"You aren't meeting this on your own, Carlos," Cecil says, as if he's listening to Carlos's very heart. That he might actually be doesn't make Carlos blink, as Cecil tells him, "You're so brilliantly self-reliant; but you don't have to rely on just yourself now. Never again." Cecil's voice is soft and gentle and forceful and hard as steel, a paradox that makes Carlos feel simultaneously safe and fearless; protected and wanting to protect. Hearing it, he knows he has a place here, a place he fits like he was born to it or like he spent his whole life finding it; and now here, he'll do about anything to stay, anything to save it. 

This is the—almost—Voice of Night Vale, the Voice that can convince people to die for Night Vale and to live for Night Vale. The Voice that has and will call the city to arms.

"—But it's too risky to seek the others at night," Cecil picks up again, casually, as if his previous statement isn't still resounding in the air. "So tonight I should rest up, Teddy said. I was hoping to get a lift to my place; I think I'd sleep better in my own bed—I'd drive myself, but my car's still back at the station, and it's late to call a taxi..."

Carlos may not be great at taking hints, but Cecil is fortunately just as bad at being subtle. So Carlos drives Cecil home, helps him up the short walk to his apartment, Cecil leaning on him heavily.

But his eyes still glitter with that frantic, flooding energy, and he's not too tired to speak, gushing gratitude and glad relief that he'll soon be back on the air. Once inside his arms latch around Carlos with surprising strength, pushing him back against the door. "I missed you, Carlos," he says, "I've missed you so much, all this time in the hospital, and I had to do it, but I wanted, I wanted to—" and his voice is so painfully pleading that Carlos has to kiss him to silence it.

They're supposed to rest; but after napping most of the day Carlos isn't sleepy. And Cecil is too wired, can't seem to stop talking. Besides, Carlos missed him at least as much. So when they finally do stumble to Cecil's bed, lips locked and clothing tangled around their limbs, it's not to sleep. Not for some time.

Afterwards, as Cecil sprawls diagonal across the mattress, sated and temporarily hushed, Carlos kisses his lips, his throat, his chest with its breathing lungs and beating heart, telling him in his own simple, meaningless voice, "I'll never leave you alone, either, Cecil, not if I can help it."

He can't make it true just by saying it, isn't strong enough to make an absolute promise in Night Vale. But Cecil sighs, content, as his breathing slows into the silent evenness of sleep.

 

* * *

 

Carlos wakes the next morning to a murmuring female voice, and the telltale catch of Cecil's breath as he takes a contract. He starts to consciousness with a gasp, flailing up in bed to confront the intruder. Cecil pats his arm soothingly. "It's just the Faceless Old Woman," he explains. "She gave me a chance to rest first, wasn't that thoughtful?"

After a quick breakfast he only bothers with at Cecil's insistence, Carlos drives Cecil out to the entrance of the abandoned mineshaft which is one of Night Vale's top five worst-kept secrets. He wants to go in with Cecil, but the sheriff's secret police are stubborn, if apologetic. And Cecil points out that Carlos has his own task to accomplish.

So Carlos returns to the lab, where he spends a couple hours disassembling various equipment and giving increasingly absurd excuses for the destruction. His colleagues stop asking when he explains, in detail, the importance of removing all the transformers from the electron microscope before they overload in a wave of quantum flux radiation rolling in from Jupiter and turn everyone in the lab into Chihuahuas. After that they keep out of his way, but for the occasional apprehensive glance. 

Carlos ignores them, knowing they'll do the same. It's an unspoken rule around the lab that every scientist in Night Vale is allowed three nervous breakdowns per annum, and Carlos has a couple banked. No one tries to stop him from loading the boxes of transistors, oscillator circuits, modulators and the rest into his car's trunk.

He returns to the mineshaft early, and spends another hour in the mesa's shade, unscrewing transistors from circuit boards. Finally Cecil emerges, supported between two secret police, stumbling and squinting in the sun. Carlos hurries over, and there is a terrifying moment when he goes to take Cecil's arm and Cecil pulls back, looking confused, like he doesn't know why Carlos is there, or even who Carlos is.

"What did you do to him?" Carlos demands. "He wasn't here for re-education—!"

"We didn't," the shorter secret police officer protests. Carlos recognizes her voice, though she doesn't lift her helmet's mirrored visor. "We let him speak to all the prisoners, that's it—"

"—And even if they did get in a little, I'm sure it was justified," Cecil says hoarsely. "Really, Carlos, as a scientist, don't you appreciate the value of education?"

"Not _re-_ education," Carlos protests, as the secret police transfer their subject to him. Cecil clings to Carlos like a man on a speeding bus clings to a pole; he can't seem to find his footing on the sand, or maybe it's his own feet he can't find. Carlos has to manhandle him to the car, gets him seated and takes his shoulders, trying to meet his dazed, dilated eyes. "Cecil, are you with me? Do you remember what they gave you?"

Cecil's eyes roll to his and then past. "Perspective," he says. "A little too much at a time, but then again, time is relative, and we're all related; we're all here. Though you're not here, Carlos, you're at the lab—"

"I'm here now," Carlos explains. Cecil's pulse is steady, and his speech is unslurred, precisely pronounced if incoherent. "I was at the lab before. Did they mention any drugs by name, Cecil? Did you swallow or drink anything, or were they injected, or aerosolized, or—"

"I wouldn't be medicated on the job," Cecil says, sounding affronted. "It's unprofessional. I'm not high, Carlos—or low, or to the side; I am right here, and know exactly where that is. Exactly where everyone is—I didn't realize the secret police had quite that many...and not all of them are happy to be there, even with the HBO, and knowing it's for the good of the community. But we all must make sacrifices; one can't be part of something without offering a part of oneself in turn. The hand you are holding cannot reach for anything else, trapped in your grip; nor can your own hand, unless you let go," and he's dropped into his most abstract voice, dark enough to send shivers down Carlos's spine even under the hot sun.

He makes sure Cecil is buckled in, then drives them back to town. He doesn't try to ask any more questions, just lets Cecil ramble. It's almost like having the radio on again, that sonorous baritone shading and softening the desert's harshness.

After a bit, Cecil turns his head on the car seat toward Carlos and remarks, in a more present tone, "Also, I shouldn't say, but I'm pretty sure Hiram McDaniels _is_ getting high on the mandated aromatherapy; dragons are scent-sensitive, and lilac is such a strong fragrance...but putting up with that many heads, he deserves to get out of some of them occasionally, don't you think? It's no worse than anyone else's vices, even if we do hold our public figures to higher standards."

"If you say so, Cecil."

Cecil reaches out to smooth Carlos's hair back from his ear, traces one finger around the lobe, so delicately that Carlos twitches. "Beautiful," Cecil sighs. "Thank you for allowing me to fill these exquisite ears. It helps to be listened to."

"The whole town will be listening to you again soon," Carlos assures him. "But you can talk to me anytime." He wonders how selfish it is, to enjoy having Cecil's monologues all to himself. "Where should we go next?"

He regrets asking, when Cecil says the Night Vale Public Library; but Carlos obediently drives over, parks in the always-empty lot and waits while Cecil enters the building. The library's current iteration is in the classical style, with molded concrete columns and statues of proud manticores, all a little singed from the last arson attempt. Carlos watches the glass windows behind the columns but doesn't see any movement, until Cecil exits again.

He's walking under his own power, only limping a little, and his clothes are hardly torn. The scratch above his right eyebrow bleeds profusely, as head wounds do, but when dabbed with a kleenex it proves to be superficial. "The librarians were very cooperative, all things considered," Cecil says cheerily, as Carlos tapes a bandaid over his forehead. "They asked me if I wanted to sponsor next year's summer reading week. I think they want a rematch with Tamika Flynn—I didn't tell them that she'll probably be busy. Though it is important for children to read for fun as well as for academics..."

Carlos doesn't argue, just asks, "Where to now?"

Next Carlos stands by Cecil before the Brownstone Spire, and then they make a quick circuit of the city zoo—animals have voices too, apparently, though Carlos doesn't hear anything but the growls and warbles and grunts one would expect. After that they head to the Night Vale Twilight Retirement Home, which isn't a pleasant euphemism but is literally shrouded in a perpetual dusk. Cecil insists that he'll be safe among Night Vale's most senior citizens, a little too ardently for Carlos to believe him; but he also mentions a location nearby for Carlos to scout, to possibly start setting up.

Half a mile away, Carlos finds the old abandoned mechanics shop, shielded by a low mesa from sandstorms, but near enough to the Whispering Forest for its interference to impede detection. It's ideal; Cecil, consummate professional that he is, knows his business. In the long run they should have multiple locations, but it's a good place to set up initially. Carlos unloads his trunk, phones Cecil's current interns to come assist, and gets to work.

He loses track of time—like he always does with engineering projects, and Night Vale's uncertain chronology makes it worse—and doesn't realize it's already sunset until he's broken out of the trance of wiring and circuitry by his phone's ring. It's Cecil's number, but Old Woman Josie on the other end of the line, saying, _"—Is this thing connecting? Are you there, Carlos? Come pick us up."_

Carlos almost curses, remembers he's talking to an elderly lady and bites his tongue; but by the time he's readied a more appropriate answer Josie has hung up. He hollers final instructions to the interns as he sprints for his car and hightails it to the Twilight Retirement Home. In actual twilight it's even darker, its driveway an inky abyss, absorbing his car's headlights and blotting out the road.

Standing on the side of the road next to that darkness are a couple figures. Josie waves Carlos down before he can pull into the abyss, shepherds Cecil into the front passenger seat before clambering into the back. "About time you got here," she grumbles. "I wasn't sure if that new-fangled telephone was even working. Back in _my_ day we had resonating bloodstone circles; that was good enough for the mayor or anybody else."

"But they wouldn't fit in modern cars," Cecil says. He's sunk into the seat with his eyes closed, but his baritone sounds reassuringly steady. "Thank you for coming, Carlos."

Carlos can't help but ask anxiously, "Are you all right? Why didn't you call me yourself?"

"You had important work to do," Cecil says. "And Josie said she was happy to help—"

"Happier if we didn't overstay our welcome," Josie complains. "You should've listened to me sooner, I know those old bats. They've been trying to convince me to move into their little assisted living coven for years. Of course they'd jump at the chance to have you now, before you come back out of retirement."

"Just a little misunderstanding," Cecil answers Carlos's worried look, even if his eyes aren't open to see it. "I heard from everyone there, and we made it out in time...I just had a brief lapse when I forgot what a phone was, so Josie had to call instead. But I remember now."

Josie's car is trapped in the beyond-twilight darkness, so Carlos drives her home. Before she climbs out of the car, she asks, "By the way, Cecil, have you gotten Steve's contract yet? Or did he never come back to the hospital?"

Cecil frowns, puzzled. "Steve?" Then the frown deepens to a scowl. "Oh, _Steve Carlsberg?_ No, I haven't had to put up with him yet, thank the masters. If we're lucky he won't remember to come."

Carlos hesitates. "But weren't you and Steve Carlsberg friends, once?"

Cecil wrinkles his nose. "I suppose, in a manner of speaking. A very loose manner of speaking. We were classmates, anyway. But he's such a _jerk_ ," and he says it with such conviction that Carlos can't help but think how much better off Night Vale would be, without the likes of Steve Carlsberg interfering.

"If you say so," Josie says. "Though his ranting always spiced things up."

" _Ugh_ ," Cecil articulates his opinion of such spice.

Josie's lined mouth puckers in a contrite smile. "Good luck tomorrow," she says, patting Cecil's shoulder. "I should turn my radio on, right?"

Cecil looks at Carlos, the faith and hope on his face so bright that it practically illuminates the car. "Yes," Carlos says. "We should be ready."

Cecil is hopeful, but he's also exhausted, not making more than a token argument when Carlos drives them straight back to his apartment from Josie's. "You need to be rested, to be at your best tomorrow—that's the professional thing to do, right?" Carlos tells him, and Cecil reluctantly acquiesces. Once in bed, he falls asleep within seconds, as if keeping to a proper sleep schedule is also part of being a pro newscaster.

Carlos sits with him for a time. He tells himself it's to make sure Cecil's sleeping soundly, and has nothing to do with the play of moonlight on Cecil's face, the way that pale glow softens his familiar features to something young and strange and beautiful.

When Carlos catches himself nodding off, he gets up, tiptoeing to not disturb Cecil. After quietly shutting the living room door, he tries to make a call. It's still mid-evening, but no one answers, and there's no voice mail to leave a message.

The address is in the database of surveys from the science team's first month in town. It's not a long drive, only a few blocks from Cecil's apartment; then Carlos is standing on Steve Carlsberg's stoop, ringing the doorbell.


	9. Chapter 9

Carlos is prepared to have to bully his way inside, bang on the windows and put up a fuss. But he's only rung the doorbell once when Steve Carlsberg answers the door. He's wearing patched jeans and a worn t-shirt and holding a glass of a clear liquid that smells nothing like water.

"Hey, Carlos," he says, like Carlos showing up on his doorstep is a routine occurrence.

"Um, hello. Steve," Carlos says awkwardly. "Can I come in?"

"Sure," Steve says, stepping back from the door to give Carlos space to enter. Carlos follows him down the narrow entryway into a living room with a bare hardwood floor, lit by harsh fluorescents.

The window blinds are drawn tight, with towels stuffed into the cracks along the edges. All four walls and most of the blinds are covered in a collage of photographs, newspaper clippings, dot-matrix print-outs, with connections drawn between them in not only the conspiracist's traditional thumbtacked strings, but also brightly colored holiday ribbons and prismatic fiber optics threads, and a few finely wrought gold jewelry chains.

Carlos blinks at the decor. "Wow. This looks very...thorough?"

Steve shrugs, nods to the array of half-empty bottles on the mantelpiece and offers, "You want anything to drink?"

"Um, no. Thanks anyway."

"Suit yourself." Steve selects from the line-up and tops off his glass, the bottle's neck clinking unsteadily against the rim.

Under the glass chime and the gurgle of liquid is a faint humming murmur. Carlos turns to locate it, sees a radio sitting on top of a stack of brown cardboard filing boxes, plugged into the nearest wall socket.

When he steps closer he can make out the voice, _"...Look around you: Strex. Look inside you: Strex. Go to sleep: Strex. Believe in a smiling god—"_

"Can I turn that off?" Carlos asks. When Steve shrugs again, Carlos yanks the cord out of the wall, resisting the urge to knock the radio off the boxes. Steve will need it later.

Steve downs half his drink in one gulp, says, "It's still a recording. They're changing it every day, adding more sponsor spots; but so far they haven't managed to get someone in there live." He sits down on the shabby plaid sofa in the middle of the room, slouched but keeping his glass level with the ease of long practice.

Carlos takes a seat himself on one of the metal folding chairs which are the only other furniture, except for the boxes. "You've been listening to the broadcast, then?"

"I never turn the radio off," Steve says. "Like a good Night Vale citizen, right?"

"Cecil..." Carlos clears his throat, says, "Cecil's almost ready. To start broadcasting again."

Steve pauses with the glass halfway to his mouth. After a moment he leans forward without drinking, sets the tumbler down on another box at his feet and asks, quietly, "So he's the Voice again?"

"Almost," Carlos says. "It wasn't—it hasn't been easy for him, but he did it. He's made a new contract with the entire town."

"Of course he did," Steve says, then buries his face in his hands. "Cecil...of course he did."

Carlos intends to explain why he came here. What comes out instead is, "How do you know Cecil?"

Steve rubs his hands down his face, squints at Carlos. "He didn't tell you?"

"I didn't ask. Not in time," Carlos confesses, ashamed.

Steve must mistake his chagrin for something else, because he says, "You don't have to be jealous or anything; Cecil and I were never like that. I'm not into men, even if I'd been his type."

"I wasn't thinking about that at all, really," Carlos admits. "It's just...Cecil doesn't have many friends. Except I suppose the whole town, but..." Cecil knows everyone in Night Vale; but he never personally introduced anyone to Carlos as his friend, other than Steve. Remembered now or not.

"Everybody knows him and everybody loves him," Steve says. "And he knows everybody and he likes everybody. And he's got no friends to speak of. Yeah, that's Cecil—not the Voice; that's always been Cecil." He picks up his glass, downs the rest of it, then rolls the empty tumbler between his palms, gazing down into it as he talks like he's reading tea leaves.

"Only reason it was different for me, was because we lived on the same street when we were kids," Steve says. "Cecil and I were the only boys our age in the neighborhood who lived, so we played together, went to school together, were in the local clawing league together. That was it, really, but, you know...it'd been like that as long as we could remember. We grew up together.

"And Cecil always talked about wanting to be on the radio. I never got what the big deal was; I never really liked Leonard's show; but Cecil was so excited when he got the internship, I was happy for him. But it...changed him. Even before he was promoted. Some of it was just having a job—he didn't have much time to hang out with me anymore, and he was more responsible, having more responsibilities. He was in the Scouts, too, and I never got an envelope; and Earl Harlan had that crush on him—Earl was into radio, too, or maybe he just said he was to get close to Cecil...

"But it was more than that. Cecil wasn't just growing up; he was growing into someone else entirely. A little while after Cecil's family...well, I can't say; but after that, Leonard started letting Cecil do spots on the radio, sponsor ads, the calendar. And I'd listen, and I'd know it was Cecil talking, but sometimes I couldn't even recognize him. That was when I really started looking into the community station, the Voice of Night Vale, trying to figure it out. But Cecil—whatever I found out, he wasn't interested in hearing it. He didn't care. We argued about it—stopped talking except for arguing, pretty much.

"Then Leonard...retired." Steve shudders. Carlos decides not to ask, just lets the man continue, "I didn't see Cecil in person for a month; I only heard him on the radio. I was still angry with him, but finally I had enough and went to see him. And Cecil...the Voice recognized me immediately; he remembered my name, my address, exactly who I was—but he didn't know _me_ anymore. Or maybe it was that I didn't know him. Like we'd grown up on opposite sides of town, instead of next door; like we'd been in the same classes but never talked. One of those people whose last name you always get wrong, and you find out from a friend of a friend, a year after the fact, when they get married or have a kid or die. That was it, all that was left."

"So he didn't bear you any animosity, at that time?" Carlos asks.

Steve shakes his head. "Night Vale didn't hate me then. Not until I...ah, forget it. Ancient history. It doesn't matter anyway." He pushes himself off the couch, goes to the mantelpiece and selects a different bottle to refill his glass.

Carlos hadn't asked Cecil about this, either; but he remembers what Josie said in the hospital. "You tried to undo it. To release Cecil from the Voice."

Steve swirls the amber liquid in his tumbler, as if to make a whirlpool the question could drown in. At last he says, "Took me a couple years to track down the rite; I had to go outside of Night Vale. Every text in the library that might've had it had been censored or burned. Took another year to gather the components, and wait for the right astrological alignment.

"And after all that, it didn't work. I nearly finished the ritual before the secret police got inside the station, but Cecil, or what's in Cecil, stopped it. Broke the mirror, broke the chant—but it hadn't been working anyway, for the Voice to still be that strong. I thought it couldn't be done.

"Which didn't stop the town from despising me for trying, even if Cecil didn't press charges. But I gave up, pretty much. Moved onto other issues, other fights. Saying what no one else would dare. If they hated me already, might as well make the most of it, right?

"And then, StrexCorp sent that memo...and I hoped, for a moment there, I actually hoped..."

Carlos hunches forward, drops his head. "I'm sorry," he says. "I'm so sorry."

Glass clinks against glass, and the floorboards creak. "Don't," Steve says. "You've got no reason to apologize. You of any of us." He pushes a glass at Carlos, with a couple fingers of the same amber alcohol in his own tumbler. "Here," he says. "Looks like you need it."

"You're offering me a drink?" Carlos laughs, a strangled sound that escapes his throat as more of a whine. "You should know that it was my fault. If I'd told Cecil to leave, if I'd tried harder, I could've convinced him—we'd be long gone, if I'd really tried; but instead it was my plan, my idea to make him back into the Voice—"

"Is _that_ why you came here tonight?" Steve asks. "Looking for somebody who'd blame you? To twist this damnable town's sins into a shape that fits on your shoulders? Sorry, but I can't do that for you, Carlos. I've spent long enough under them myself; I'm sure as hell not going to put them on you, of all the wretched people in this wretched place."

"Even you." Carlos shakes his head. "I thought of anyone that Steve Carlsberg would be immune to Cecil singing my praises. Though I guess you are a citizen, and if you're always listening to the radio—" He takes a reckless swig from the tumbler, and finds it's not rotgut moonshine but a fine single-malt scotch, so smooth it doesn't start to burn until halfway down.

He coughs, and Steve pats his back, absurdly, thoughtlessly kind. "This isn't about what Cecil says about you," Steve says. "It's how he says it. How he is—you don't know, you can't know what he was like, before you came to town. The Voice of Night Vale, they start out a citizen; they start out with their own voice, along with everyone else's. But after a while... Did you ever hear of Leonard, from anyone in town, before Cecil mentioned him on his show?"

"No?" There was a period of time when Carlos had wondered if Cecil had somehow always been the Voice of Night Vale; it didn't seem like any other person had held the position, that anyone ever talked about, even in oblique references.

"No one tries to remember Leonard," Steve says. "The opposite, if anything. By the end of Leonard Burton's run as the Voice, he wasn't even...he _wasn't_. Far more than he was. And Cecil—he started out strong, he was always so strong. But year after year, there was more and more of Night Vale on the radio, and less and less of him. Once in a while, if something really frightened him, or amused him, or pissed him off; but most of the time...

"Then you and your scientists showed up. And Cecil...at first it was just the town's curiosity, but it became more. Maybe half a year after you got here, you called him—something to do with the clocks, I don't know if you were even listening to the radio then. But he played your voice messages on the air, though that was against every rule I know about, and he talked about it on his show—and it was _Cecil_ talking. I heard Cecil. Like I'd given up hearing again. And since then I've heard him more and more. Not just talking about you, but about everyone—Josie and Pamela and Earl and Dana and Hiram and everyone else—and even himself. He still spoke with the Voice of Night Vale; but he had his own voice, too.

"So no, I'm not going to resent you, Carlos, or blame you for what Cecil is. If you hadn't come to Night Vale, then when StrexCorp sent that memo, I don't know if there would've been enough left of Cecil to survive it. Even if you couldn't stop that stubborn jackass from becoming the Voice again, you've done more for him than I ever could. Sorry, but I can't hate you for that."

Not for that, Carlos thinks. But this might do it. He clears his throat, says, "The reason I came over tonight—it wasn't to talk about the past."

"Oh?" Steve says. "Then, shoot," and he takes a fortifying gulp of his own whiskey.

"You haven't contracted with the Voice of Night Vale yet."

The look in Steve's eyes isn't quite the anger Carlos was expecting, but it's not kind, either. "No, I haven't."

"Cecil's almost completed it," Carlos says. "You should speak to him before he finishes, make sure you're part of the Voice's contract. Part of this town. Since you're a citizen as much as anyone."

"No," Steve says again. His knuckles are whitening around his glass.

"I know it won't be easy," Carlos says. "Facing him now, when he speaks so resentfully about you...but that's not Cecil, Steve; it's the Voice of Night Vale. You can't hold it against him—"

"Obviously," Steve says, sounding surprised that Carlos would even mention it. "I've always known that—I never held it against Cecil. Won't say it didn't bother me sometimes, but any letter I sent, it wasn't because I was angry with _him_. Angry with everything else, yeah. And trying my damndest to piss him off—to see if I still could. To see if I could get to Cecil, more than just Night Vale.

"But the thing is, whatever I wrote, Cecil read it. He didn't need to; he could've just not mentioned me at all. Refused to read my letters, refused to admit he even got them. But he talked about every message I sent on the air; he talked about me. Cecil wouldn't let Night Vale forget me, no matter how much it might've wanted to."

"Yes," Carlos says. "Yes, and you can't be forgotten now—Night Vale needs you now more than ever, Steve. Going up against StrexCorp isn't a fight most citizens are prepared for. You have the weapons we need; you know how to ask questions, how to look for the true purposes, rather than just accept what you're told—"

"I'll fight Strex, but I'm not going to force my contract on him for the sake of this godforsaken town," Steve says, and now he is angry. "I'm not going to hurt Cecil just because Night Vale needs me. I've done the research; I know what it takes to make someone the Voice. You've witnessed it, haven't you, Carlos? You must have been there for at least some of it. Every damn person in town, torturing him to make themselves heard, to make him _theirs_ , their Voice—I'm not doing it. Not to anyone; but especially not to Cecil."

"That's—it's—"

Steve glares at him. "Don't try to tell me he's used to it—that he's been hurt enough that one more time, one more person, won't matter."

"I won't," Carlos says quietly. "I can't. It will hurt him—he is used to it, but yes, it's still a painful process. But it will hurt him more not to have you. Not just Night Vale, but Cecil himself. Even if he can't keep enough of his own memories to remember your childhood together, you're still his friend. And what he'll be doing, what he's risking, going up against Strex—Cecil is going to need every friend he can get."

Steve stares at him for a long moment. Then he heaves a sigh, shoulders sinking in resignation. "I'll think about it."

"Thank you," Carlos says.

Steve is still looking at him. "You know, I wondered about it—about you, when you first showed up. I took your survey because I was curious what Cecil was going on about. And I got to admit, the first time I met you, I didn't see it at all."

Carlos snorts in spite of himself. "There's little to see. Other than Cecil's penchant for hyperbole—has he always had that, too?"

Steve's expression changes, though Carlos can't tell to what. "No," he says. "Cecil's always been obnoxiously straightforward. He could be a real pain in the ass—he'd always tell it to you straight, even if you didn't want to hear it. It was why he wanted to do the news, to tell the truth to everyone. Though truth here gets twisted a lot, so it doesn't sound like it does elsewhere. But Cecil still speaks it, as much as he can, as far as I've heard. And sometimes he sees it clearer than anyone else."

He recognizes the way Steve is looking at him now; Carlos knows that look too well, after so long in Night Vale. It took him a year to come to terms with it in Cecil's eyes; he still hasn't figured out how to deal with it elsewhere. To cover for it, he raises his tumbler, suggests, "To telling the truth, even if no one wants to hear it."

Steve grins, a little twisted from lack of practice. "To StrexCorp, and Cecil being a pain in their smiling god's ass."

They tap glasses and drink. It really is excellent scotch; Carlos prefers it to Cecil's expensive brandy, though he's not about to admit that. He declines a second, leaving Steve to finish the bottle by himself, tonight or some other night.

Outside, he finds that tonight's sky is as much stars as void, but Carlos doesn't take his chances alone; he goes back to Cecil's apartment. Fortunately Cecil is deep enough out that he isn't wakened by Carlos crawling into bed. He slows his breaths to match Cecil's silent ones, soon lulled to sleep by that steady rhythm, and the assurance of Cecil's living warmth beside him.

 

* * *

 

This night, Carlos dreams—the first he's dreamed in days, or maybe just the first dream he remembers. The nightmare begins the same; he's standing on the mountain overlooking Night Vale, notebook and pen in hand. He raises his hand to turn on the spotlight, to illuminate the town and expose all its secrets.

Then he pauses, hesitating. Until a voice speaks in his ear, as familiar as his own, though it is not his tenor. _Do it,_ the voice says. _We're ready._

So Carlos calls out, and the spotlight comes on, searing Night Vale with its brilliance. But Carlos does not look down at the town; instead he looks up, staring into the spotlight's dazzling illumination until his eyes ache. He points his hand at it, sure and certain, marking its position, triangulating its location.

There is a thrumming in the air, the beat of helicopter blades behind the spotlight's yellow glare.

 _Now!_ says the voice in his ears—one Voice, and thousands of voices all speaking as one, and Carlos with them.

Aloud, Carlos shouts, " _There!_ "

And at the command their counterattack comes whistling through the night, meets the light and explodes in a burst of furious sound and color.

Then there is only utter darkness. Carlos cannot see the light, or Night Vale, or the mountain he stands upon. He cannot tell if this is the emptiness of the void, or if his eyes have been burned from his head by that burst of light.

The dark surrounds him, cool and safe and soothing, and Carlos wakes up. He wakes up in Cecil's bed, in Cecil's shadowy bedroom, with Cecil's arms wrapped around him as Cecil's breaths fan against his ear.

Carlos wakes up smiling. He lies still for a moment, appreciating the miracle of his existence, that he is here, of anywhere in the universe he could be. Then he puts his hand over Cecil's, pressed over his own heart, and goes back to sleep.

 

* * *

 

They've only just awoken the next morning when Cecil's doorbell rings, followed by aggravated knocking on the front door. Cecil dons his dressing gown, patterned in dizzying, non-Euclidean shapes and trimmed in velvet nearly as rich as his voice, and answers the door with a friendly, "Good morning, who's—"

Then his voice thickens in disgust. "—Oh, it's you, _Steve Carlsberg._ "

Carlos peers over Cecil's shoulder to see Steve standing on the doorstep. He's in the same t-shirt and jeans as last night, unshaven and hungover, but not drunk by the clearness of his voice.

"I don't like that you're the Voice, Cecil," Steve states, "but you are, and you're a good one. And I'm a citizen of this damn town—so you're my Voice, too."

Carlos puts his hand on Cecil's shoulder, so he feels the tension and then the release of Cecil accepting the contract, though Cecil doesn't make a sound. He just glowers at Steve Carlsberg, until Steve shrugs and walks away.

"Hold on," Carlos says, pulling on a lab coat over his sweatpants to follow Steve out into the crisp morning air. He catches up with him on the apartment's stoop. "Thanks for coming," he says. "I'm sorry that Cecil—"

"It's okay, Carlos," Steve says, wincing a bit in the sunlight. "I wasn't expecting it to be any different."

"But it will be, though," Carlos says. "At least somewhat. It's a new contract. And now there's at least one person in Night Vale who doesn't hate you, other than Cecil himself."

Steve squints at him. "I've always been here," he points out.

"I know," Carlos says.

"Carlos?" Cecil asks from the top of the stairs. When Carlos turns to him, Steve takes the opportunity to head for his car.

But he stops when Cecil says, "Wait."

Cecil is gazing up at the sky, frowning at it like he's reading cues in the clouds that he disapproves of. "It took you long enough to come," he says. "Thanks for holding everything up, _Steve_." He bites off the name before the surname, deliberately, still not looking at the man.

Steve looks from him to Carlos, eyebrows up and forgetting to scowl in his surprise. In spite of everything, he's a citizen of Night Vale; he can have hope when there should be none.

Carlos can't quite bring himself to smile, but he nods. Steve nods back, lifts his hand in a wave and says, "See you around, Cecil, Carlos," as he gets into his Corolla.

Cecil is still frowning as Carlos climbs the stairs back up next to him, puts an arm around his waist and tells him, "Thank you."

"I don't like him," Cecil says, but not heatedly; contemplatively, almost confused.

"I know," Carlos says. 

It's not until they're dressed and leaving that Cecil admits, grudgingly, "But I'm...glad, that he finally showed up. It wouldn't be the same, without him."

 

* * *

 

Cecil has a few more people (or approximations thereof) around Night Vale to hear from, but he convinces Carlos that they're best dealt with alone, especially as Carlos doesn't have the City Council's permission to know about the existence of most of them.

Carlos has little choice but to agree. Besides, he still has the final wiring and tests to do at the old mechanic's shop. When he's done, he leaves the interns to finish mounting the antennae, while he drops by the Ralph's and picks up the ingredients for a tamal de cazuela—his mother would roll her eyes at making a casserole a dinner by itself, and it'd be too hearty to end a normal fast; but it's comfort food for Carlos, and he knows Cecil likes it. Even if it's not whatever Cecil's mother used to make him.

Carlos has just stepped out of his kitchen when his cellphone rings. _"I'm almost done,"_ Cecil says, as casually as if he's finishing a show. _"One—in a manner of speaking—more to go. Meet me here?"_

"Where?" Carlos asks as he gets on his shoes.

 _"The Whispering Forest,"_ Cecil says.

Carlos nearly drops his shoe. He keeps his voice level with effort. "Is that necessary? It appeared after I arrived; shouldn't it have been contracted to you directly, like I was?"

 _"I never spoke to the Forest in person,"_ Cecil says. _"The words I had from it were from listener contributions and the citizens who now are part of it. Confirming that shouldn't take long; as a shared intellect it'll only need a single contract. —And no, you can't come with me,"_ Cecil adds before Carlos can ask. _"The Forest can't admire a single luxurious hair on your head; I saw you first."_

This doesn't stop Carlos from running every stop sign on the way to the Whispering Forest like he's got a fully stamped Alert Citizen's card. There are several vehicles parked outside the grove, most with branches and bramble growing through their broken windows and rusted wheel rims, as if they've been here for years instead of a few weeks or months. Cecil's car is the only one untouched.

Carlos pulls out his phone as he stares into the dense, improbable foliage. A single path leads into the Forest, the wind through its heavy boughs promising respite from the desert sun. It's been twenty minutes since Cecil called, and Carlos holds his breath as the phone rings once, twice—how much time does it take the Forest to—

 _"Hi, Carlos!"_ Cecil's bright voice answers. _"Great timing!"_

Carlos sees Cecil walk out from between the trees and wave to him, silhouetted against the incongruous greenery. He's smiling when he reaches Carlos. "They've very friendly," he says. "It really is a lovely place."

Carlos checks his skin for bark or buds, but there's no green showing, and Cecil shakes his head when Carlos asks if he's tempted to go back. "Too much to do," he says, "and besides it'd be lonely, to have only the Forest's voice to listen to."

Then he grabs Carlos's arm, as if he's been holding back and can't any longer. "Are you ready? Can I—"

It's mid-afternoon, by the untrustworthy sun; good timing indeed. "It's ready," Carlos says.

He drives them both over to the old mechanic's shop. They can pick up Cecil's car later; Carlos doesn't trust him behind the wheel now—Cecil is jittery, not nervous but so excited that he's almost vibrating. His enthusiasm isn't quelled when they reach the mechanic's shop to find waiting, in addition to the radio interns, the entire City Council. Their fleet of limousines in unlikely colors fill the dusty lot.

"I called them; it's just a formality," Cecil reassures Carlos. "We don't want to have to go through all this again anytime soon, do we? So best to have all the i's dotted and t's crossed and ≉'s hexed, for the next changeover."

He means it literally; the Council has a written contract this time, several pages ripped from a spiral-bound notebook and unevenly stapled together. It's written in a spidery, rust-brown script that Carlos assumes is dried blood until he gets a whiff and decides it's tomato juice. Or possibly tabasco sauce. By the splotching of the pseudo-ink, the contract was written up hastily. He suspects the Council forgot to do it until Cecil's call.

Cecil reads it over, flips back to reread a couple parts. He's frowning, and Carlos almost asks to see—he's no lawyer, but he has a scientist's understanding of precision and rules.

But Cecil doesn't show it to him. He glances at Carlos once, sidelong and smiling slightly. Then Cecil tears off the contract's first page, and rips it down the middle, dropping the rest into the sand, so he's left holding only a slip of paper with a few cramped sentences.

He sets this amended contract down on the hood of Carlos's car, bites his thumb and presses his bloody print over the final period. "There you go," he says cheerfully, handing the ragged strip of paper back to the nearest council member.

The council member stares at back him for a long minute, before finally taking the strip and folding it away into a pocket. Then all the Council folds themselves away into their respective limos, and pull out in clouds of dust, tailed by a few vague but menacing black SUVs.

Carlos looks up. The sky is burnt sienna, as if it forgot to change after dawn, cloudless and clear. A yellow helicopter would stand out plainly against it, but there are none. For now, at least, they have the advantage. 

The interns are standing by the ramshackle mechanic's shop, in front of the precariously tilting tower of rusting cars which hides the antennae. They smile at Cecil, proud and nervous, and open the office door for him.

Cecil stops just inside the doorway, looking around. Carlos looks with him, noticing what he didn't before, focused as he was on building the transmitter. He sees the thick layer of dust and grime over the windows, caked on the broken shelves. He smells the reek of old motor oil and rusting metal and the traces of the giant scorpions the interns helped him evict with brooms.

It's nothing like Cecil's tidy, professional studio at the community radio station. Carlos thinks despairingly that they should have taken five minutes to dust, at least to sweep up the wires scattered on the floor. The only vaguely clean surface is the battered metal office desk, haphazardly cleared, a box of transistors sitting on one corner. All that distinguishes it is the microphone in the middle, not a real radio mic but a cheap, fragile bit of plastic, plugged directly into the open circuitboard Carlos threw together, literally when it came to some parts.

"Is that my desk?" Cecil asks, pointing to it, and Carlos reluctantly has to nod.

"Oh, Carlos..." and Cecil beams, as widely as he did the first time Carlos came to the station, his first day in Night Vale, meeting the Voice with his wailing Geiger counter. "It's perfect!"

Cecil all but flings himself into the rickety folding chair. He's still grinning as he puts on the outdated, heavy headset, scrounged from the garage of one of the interns. Carlos throws the switches one by one, and the equipment hums to life.

It's wrong to be standing here, Carlos thinks, without soundproof glass between them to preserve the broadcast's integrity. He starts to step away, at least put himself behind the desk.

But Cecil reaches back, without looking finds Carlos's hand and clasps it tight, holding him in place. With his other hand he presses the button on the microphone, and its diode glows telltale red, like an opened eye.

And as soon as Cecil opens his mouth, as soon as the Voice speaks, Carlos knows—all of Night Vale knows—that they are going to prevail.

* * *

_Look at yourself._

_Look outside of yourself._

_Wake up._

_Realize that all liars smile._

_Welcome to Night Vale Pirate Radio._

~

the end

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks so much for the comments and kudos and bookmarks and everything - I had way too much fun with this story (...I'm so sorry, Carlos, Cecil...) and it's great to know other folks enjoyed it, too!


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